Re: font-encoded hacks
On 07/10/16 07:42, Denis Jacquerye wrote: In may case people resort to these hacks because it is an easier short term solution. All they have to do is use a specific font. They don't have to switch or find and install a keyboard layout and they don't have to upgrade to an OS that supports their script with Unicode properly. Because of these sort term solutions it's hard for a switch to Unicode to gain proper momentum. Unfortunately, not everybody sees the long term benefit, or often they see it but cannot do it practically. Too often Unicode compliant fonts or keyboard layouts have been lacking or at least have taken much longer to be implemented. One could wonder if a technical group for keyboards layouts would help this process. What might also help is a reconceptualization of these hacks as being in effect non-standard character encodings: the existing software infrastructure for handling charsets could then be co-opted to convert them to (and possibly from) Unicode if desired. Neil
Re: Why incomplete subscript/superscript alphabet ?
On 03/10/16 18:59, Steve Swales wrote: On Oct 3, 2016, at 10:14 AM, Doug Ewell wrote: a.lukyanov wrote: I think that the right thing to do would be to create several new control/formatting characters, like this: "previous character is superscript" "previous character is subscript" "previous character is small caps (for use in phonetic transcription only)" "previous character is mathematical blackletter" etc Then people will be able to apply this features on any character as long as their font supports it. I happen to think this would be exactly the wrong thing to do, completely contrary to the principles of plain text that Unicode was founded upon. But you never know what might gain traction, so stay tuned. I guess I don’t see how it is fundamentally different from other variant selector uses within Unicode, and the ability to write properly formatted mathematical and chemical formulas (for example) in a plain text environment like text messaging seems like a fairly compelling use case. -steve Yes, but since there are existing well-standardized higher-level protocols already in existence (HTML, MATHML, TeX, etc. etc.) that do exactly that. They should be used instead, as opposed to trying to make Unicode something other than a plain-text character encoding, contrary to its design principles. Moreover, while you describe seems superficially simple, as soon as you try to expand it, you will find you end up with systems like this: http://unicode.org/notes/tn28/UTN28-PlainTextMath.pdf which are neither one nor the other, and in spite of their proposal as a plain-text notation, actually ends up being an ad-hoc higher-level protocol anyway. Neil
Re: APL Under-bar Characters
On 17/08/15 17:23, Doug Ewell wrote: In that case, despite the text in Section 22.7 that Ken quoted, it seems that U+0331 COMBINING MACRON might be a better choice for APL "underlined letters" than U+0332 COMBINING LOW LINE. Compare A̱ḆC̱ with A̲B̲C̲, noting that your font and rendering engine mileage may vary. "Voting again" to change one of the basic rules of Unicode, on the basis that "perhaps feelings about the under-bar characters have changed since then," is not expected to be an option, as David said. Doug is right. One small correction: U+0331 is COMBINING MACRON BELOW, not COMBINING MACRON. Wikipedia has an excellent article on this topic: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macron_below -- Neil
Re: Plain text (from Re: Avoidance variants)
On 26/03/15 23:27, Mark E. Shoulson wrote: On 03/26/2015 11:18 AM, William_J_G Overington wrote: > Blocks of boring plain text, no italics or effects any more complex than justification, simple notes written all in one font with no formatting to speak of etc. I am wondering if it is considered a good idea to define into Plane 14 some formatting characters, so that plain text could in the future contain italics and so on. And we could define "plain water" to include sugar and flavorings, and have Coke run out of our taps. But that isn't "plain water" anymore. And yes, we DO allow some additives in water and still call it "plain", even as we do have some formatting characters in Unicode and call it plain text (e.g. tab, formfeed, ZWJ, RLO, PDF, etc) Alternatively, you could say we already have such things encodable as plain text, using character sequences, like U+003C U+0069 U+003E to indicate "BEGIN ITALICS", etc... Just need the right reader... ~mark Or you could just redefine "&" and "<" as U+0026 START HTML ENTITY and U+003C START HTML TAG and be done with it, and just incorporate HTML5 into Unicode forever, thus eliminating these discussions from this list, and moving them to the W3C and WHATWG lists... -- Neil ___ Unicode mailing list Unicode@unicode.org http://unicode.org/mailman/listinfo/unicode
Admuncher javascript on Unicode site
I've just noticed that loading the web page http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2014/14250.htm loads a script from "interceptedby.admuncher.com" This seems pretty peculiar to me. Is this intended? Neil Harris ___ Unicode mailing list Unicode@unicode.org http://unicode.org/mailman/listinfo/unicode
Re: Websites in Hindi
On 03/03/14 18:14, James Lin wrote: another problem you may need to consider is the support of the glyph/fonts on your system. Not all fonts are supported/install by default when installing the OS. Warm Regards, -James This is where webfonts should be extremely useful -- I believe recent versions of at least Firefox, and probably other modern browsers, should support both webfonts and text shaping for Indic scripts by default, whether or not the underlying platform has the correct fonts. Neil ___ Unicode mailing list Unicode@unicode.org http://unicode.org/mailman/listinfo/unicode
Re: The Ruble sign has been approved
On 12/12/13 15:14, William_J_G Overington wrote: Michael Everson wrote: I’m already on it. Excellent. Would it be possible please for encoding to include specific official guidance, going back to a source with provenance, as to whether a glyph for the symbol in a serif font should or should not have serifs? William Overington 12 December 2013 I would imagine that this is left to the discretion of the font designer, as in all other simlar currency symbols, where the style of the currency symbol follows the style of the rest of the font. -- N.
Re: Why blackletter letters?
On 12/09/13 11:26, Johan Winge wrote: On Wed, 11 Sep 2013 20:29:51 +0200, Hans Aberg wrote: ... The symbol for the empty set ∅ is originally a Greek letter phi ϕ, ans some use the latter. According to the autobiography of André Weil, quoted at http://jeff560.tripod.com/set.html, the empty set symbol ∅ was inspired by the Scandinavian Ø, and would then have nothing to do with the Greek phi, except for a superficial resemblance. I'm aware that some mathematician indeed do use Φ/φ, supposedly due to this misconception and/or lacking coverage in fonts and/or carelessness, but I find it terribly annoying. Really, it is no more correct than using ß in lieu of β. -- Johan Winge Do some mathematicians _really_ use Φ/φ instead of ∅, or does it just look like they're doing so? Careless handwriting of ∅ could indeed look like Φ or even φ, but I doubt they're thinking "phi, the symbol for the empty set" as they do so. TeX is universal in the typesetting of mathematics, and the symbol is visually quite distinct from the Greek letter, which mathematicians will also see on a daily basis: if they've ever been exposed to TeX, they must surely have made the distinction, and just reading papers should be enough to make the difference clear. Neil
Re: Suggestion for new dingbats/symbols
On 31/05/13 20:37, Asmus Freytag (w) wrote: I think that research that does precisely this kind of task of correlating symbol repertoires against each other is extremely valuable in its own right. Additional research that documents the usage of these symbols -- in computing environments -- would also be useful. Reliable facts on users and the tasks in which they use particular symbols (represented in filed and data) would be a better basis to argue about possible encodings than just the existence of symbols or whether they are highly recognizable when seen on signage. Having said that, documenting the details of ongoing efforts at understanding symbols by posting each small finding on this list is probably inappropriate. That kind of effort belongs in a research project aimed at symbols. A./ Thanks! I agree that a mailing list is a very poor venue for this -- I just wanted to demonstrate that the repertoire of public information symbols was quite coherent, and very amenable to unification, instead of being a random grab-bag of pictograms with no defined boundaries -- and then I got carried away. ISO has its TC 145 committee to talk about exactly this, and no doubt they will have a lot of this sewn up already, but it's not really a public forum, and their documents are not freely available. Is there an alternative forum that could be used to develop something in a crowdsourced, collaborative way that could later be refined to generate a more formal document such as a Unicode encoding proposal? Something as simple as a wiki would work fine in the short term... Neil
Re: Suggestion for new dingbats/symbols
The ECOMO of symbols set is particularly interesting, as it seems to be a compendium of not just the ISO 7001 symbols, but also the DOT and AIGA symbols, and almost all the other symbols I could think of as meeting my earlier criteria, such as the ubiquitous "running man" emergency exit symbol. the stylized "i" information symbol, and the symbols for sports activities. There is a list of all 125 of them here: http://www.ecomo.or.jp/barrierfree/pictogram/picto_top.html After a bit more research, I found this blog post: http://tavmjong.free.fr/blog/?p=700 which suggests that the AIGA set and the Department of Transportation set are one and the same, and that the ECOMO and ISO 7001 pictograph sets were derived from this starting set of pictograms. I've had a quick go at unifying the ECOMO and AGIA sets with one another and symbols already encoded in Unicode, which suggests that around 126 new characters might need to be encoded to complete both the ECOMO/AGIA sets. Details below the fold: I've tried to keep the various names I've used close to the names in the actual standards themselves. I'm sure there are errors in this, as well as missed opportunities for unification, but it's a start on estimating the scope of the task of completing the set of commonly used public information symbols. -- Neil AIGA_TELEPHONE = ECOMO_TELEPHONE AIGA_MAIL = ECOMO_POST AIGA_CASHIER AIGA_ESCALATOR = ECOMO_ESCALATOR AIGA_TOILETS = ECOMO_TOILETS = UNICODE_1F6BB_RESTROOM AIGA_NURSERY = ECOMO_NURSERY = UNICODE_1F6BC_BABY_SYMBOL AIGA_DRINKING_FOUNTAIN AIGA_TAXI = ECOMO_TAXI_/_TAXI_STAND = UNICODE_1F696_ONCOMING_TAXI AIGA_BUS = ECOMO_BUS_/_BUS_STOP = UNICODE_1F68D_ONCOMING_BUS AIGA_LOST_AND_FOUND = ECOMO_LOST_AND_FOUND = UNICODE_1F6C5_LEFT_LUGGAGE AIGA_STAIRS = ECOMO_STAIRS AIGA_ELEVATOR = ECOMO_ELEVATOR AIGA_WAITING_ROOM = ECOMO_LOUNGE_/_WAITING_ROOM AIGA_INFORMATION = ECOMO_INFORMATION AIGA_HOTEL_INFORMATION AIGA_AIR_TRANSPORTATION = ECOMO_AIRCRAFT_/_AIRPORT AIGA_HELIPORT = ECOMO_HELICOPTER_/_HELIPORT = UNICODE_1F681_HELICOPTER AIGA_RAIL_TRANSPORTATION = ECOMO_RAILWAY_/_RAILWAY_STATION AIGA_WATER_TRANSPORTATION = ECOMO_SHIP_/_FERRY_/_PORT = UNICODE_1F6A2_SHIP AIGA_ROAD_TRANSPORTATION AIGA_TOILETS_FEMALE = ECOMO_WOMEN = UNICODE_1F6BA_WOMENS_SYMBOL AIGA_CAR_RENTAL = ECOMO_RENT_A_CAR AIGA_RESTUARANT = ECOMO_RESTAURANT AIGA_COFFEESHOP = ECOMO_COFFEE_SHOP AIGA_BAR = ECOMO_BAR AIGA_SHOPS = ECOMO_SHOP AIGA_BARBER_SHOP_BEAUTY_SALON = ECOMO_BARBER_/_BEAUTY_SALON AIGA_BARBER_SHOP AIGA_BEAUTY_SALON AIGA_TICKET_PURCHASE = ECOMO_TICKETS_/_FARE_ADJUSTMENT AIGA_BAGGAGE_CHECK_IN = AIGA_BAGGAGE_COLLECTION AIGA_DEPARTING_FLIGHTS AIGA_ARRIVING_FLIGHTS = ECOMO_ARRIVALS AIGA_SMOKING = ECOMO_SMOKING_AREA = UNICODE_1F6AC_SMOKING_SYMBOL AIGA_NO_SMOKING = ECOMO_NO_SMOKING = UNICODE_1F6AD_NO_SMOKING_SYMBOL AIGA_PARKING = ECOMO_PARKING AIGA_NO_PARKING = ECOMO_NO_PARKING AIGA_NO_DOGS = ECOMO_NO_UNCAGED_ANIMALS AIGA_NO_ENTRY = ECOMO_NO_ENTRY = UNICODE_26D4_NO_ENTRY AIGA_EXIT AIGA_FIRE_EXTINGUISHER = ECOMO_FIRE_EXTINGUISHER AIGA_LITTER_DISPOSAL AIGA_TOILETS_MEN = ECOMO_MEN = UNICODE_1F6B9_MENS_SYMBOL AIGA_STAIRS_UP AIGA_STARIS_DOWN AIGA_CURRENCY_EXCHANGE AIGA_FIRST_AID = ECOMO_FIRST_AID AIGA_BAGGAGE_LOCKERS AIGA_ESCALATOR_DOWN AIGA_ESCALATOR_UP AIGA_COAT_CHECK = ECOMO_CLOAKROOM AGIA_SYMBOL_RIGHT_POINTING_ARROW = ECOMO_SYMBOL_RIGHT_POINTING_ARROW = UNICODE_27A1_BLACK_RIGHTWARDS_ARROW AGIA_SYMBOL_FORWARD_AND_RIGHT_POINTING_ARROW = ECOMO_SYMBOL_FORWARD_AND_RIGHT_POINTING_ARROW = UNICODE_2B08_NORTH_EAST_BLACK_ARROW AGIA_SYMBOL_FORWARD_POINTING_ARROW = ECOMO_SYMBOL_FORWARD_POINTING_ARROW = UNICODE_2B06_UPWARDS_BLACK_ARROW AGIA_SYMBOL_FORWARD_AND_LEFT_POINTING_ARROW = ECOMO_SYMBOL_FORWARD_AND_LEFT_POINTING_ARROW = UNICODE_2B09_NORTH_WEST_BLACK_ARROW AGIA_SYMBOL_LEFT_POINTING_ARROW = ECOMO_SYMBOL_LEFT_POINTING_ARROW = UNICODE_2B05_LEFTWARDS_BLACK_ARROW AGIA_SYMBOL_DOWNWARD_AND_LEFT_POINTING_ARROW = ECOMO_SYMBOL_DOWNWARD_AND_LEFT_POINTING_ARROW = UNICODE_2B0B_SOUTH_WEST_BLACK_ARROW AGIA_SYMBOL_DOWNWARD_POINTING_ARROW = ECOMO_SYMBOL_DOWNWARD_POINTING_ARROW = UNICODE_2B07_DOWNWARDS_BLACK_ARROW AGIA_SYMBOL_DOWNWARD_AND_RIGHT_POINTING_ARROW = ECOMO_SYMBOL_DOWNWARD_AND_RIGHT_POINTING_ARROW = UNICODE_2B0A_SOUTH_EAST_BLACK_ARROW ECOMO_CUSTOMS_/_BAGGAGE_CHECK = AIGA_CUSTOMS = UNICODE_1F6C3_CUSTOMS ECOMO_IMMIGRATION_/_QUARANTINE_/_INSPECTION = AIGA_IMMIGRATION = UNICODE_1F6C2_PASSPORT_CONTROL ECOMO_QUESTION_AND_ANSWER ECOMO_HOSPITAL ECOMO_POLICE ECOMO_ACCESSIBLE_FACILITY ECOMO_ACCESSIBLE_SLOPE ECOMO_DRINKING_WATER ECOMO_CHECK-IN_/_RECEPTION ECOMO_HOTEL_/_ACCOMMODATION ECOMO_BAGGAGE_STORAGE ECOMO_COIN_LOCKERS ECOMO_MEETING_POINT ECOMO_BANK,_MONEY_EXCHANGE ECOMO_CASH_SERVICE ECOMO_FAX ECOMO_CART ECOMO_DRESSING_ROOM ECOMO_DRESSING_ROOM(WOMEN) ECOMO_SHOWER = UNICODE_1F6BF_SHOWER ECOMO_BATH = UNICODE_1F6C0_BATH ECOMO_WATER_FOUNTAIN ECOMO_TRASH_BOX ECOMO_COLLECTION_FACILITY_FOR_THE_RECYCLING_PRODUCTS ECOMO_BICYCLE = UNICODE_1F6B2_BICYC
Re: Suggestion for new dingbats/symbols
On 31/05/13 01:13, Dreiheller, Albrecht wrote: Watching the discussion on symbols, icons, signs, emoticons of the last days, I'm thinking a little bit philosophically about the question: Where will we end up? Is communicating with symbols like a new easy-to-learn universal language? Is this our new Lingua Franca? Even if there will be more different symbols than Chinese characters? Well, it might be easy to understand symbols, if the context is clear and if they are displayed or printed with good quality. So the _receptive vocabulary_ might be pretty big for many people. That's certainly my rationale. I'm not arguing for the encoding of all pictograms, and even more so not advocating the use or development of novel pictographic languages or any such similar development. I'm only arguing for the encoding of pictograms that are * in widespread use internationally * that are used commonly in contexts where they are _used like, or in, text_, in particular their use in Rosetta Stone-like multilingual signs * that belong to standardized sets * and that are instantly recognised understood by a _very large_ number of people from a wide range of cultures Over and above this, I think that this can also be combined with a "complete the existing set" rationale. After a lot of Googling, I have discovered that many, but not all, of the ISO 7001 symbols already seem to have been encoded in the block U+1F680 - 1F6FF, Transport and Map Symbols, which also contains other similar symbols which to the best of my knowledge are not part of ISO 7001. A quick glance at the Unicode code tables shows that several other ISO 7001 symbols are already encoded elsewhere: * U+267F WHEELCHAIR SYMBOL * U+26D4 NO ENTRY * U+260E BLACK TELEPHONE * U+2B06 UPWARDS BLACK ARROW, in a block with seven other arrows pointing to the other cardinal points * U+1F481 INFORMATION DESK PERSON has an obvious equivalent in ISO 7001 I also spotted a number of other symbols that I think meet the definition I gave above which are already encoded, presumably using a similar rationale to the one I gave above: * U+2623 BIOHAZARD SIGN * U+2620 SKULL AND CROSSBONES * U+2622 RADIOACTIVE SIGN The ECOMO of symbols set is particularly interesting, as it seems to be a compendium of not just the ISO 7001 symbols, but also the DOT and AIGA symbols, and almost all the other symbols I could think of as meeting my earlier criteria, such as the ubiquitous "running man" emergency exit symbol. the stylized "i" information symbol, and the symbols for sports activities. There is a list of all 125 of them here: http://www.ecomo.or.jp/barrierfree/pictogram/picto_top.html Neil
Re: Suggestion for new dingbats/symbols
A quick look at http://signcollection.com/media/wysiwyg/DOT_ISO_7001_Pictograms.jpg http://defound.com/2011/10/the-helvetica-of-pictograms/ and http://www.aiga.org/symbol-signs/ and making up names for the DOT/ISO 7001 symbols, gives the following set of equivalences, suggesting a high degree of commonality between the symbol sets: Symbols apparently common to DOT and AIGA: DOT SYMBOL TELEPHONE = AIGA SYMBOL TELEPHONE DOT SYMBOL ENVELOPE = AIGA SYMBOL MAIL DOT SYMBOL DOLLAR IN CIRCLE = AIGA SYMBOL CASHIER DOT SYMBOL ESCALATOR = AIGA SYMBOL ESCALATOR DOT SYMBOL TOILETS MALE FEMALE = AIGA SYMBOL TOILETS DOT SYMBOL BABY = AIGA SYMBOL NURSERY DOT SYMBOL DRINKING FOUNTAIN = AIGA SYMBOL DRINKING FOUNTAIN DOT SYMBOL TAXI = AIGA SYMBOL TAXI DOT SYMBOL BUS = AIGA SYMBOL BUS DOT SYMBOL LOST PROPERTY = AIGA SYMBOL LOST AND FOUND DOT SYNBOL STAIRCASE = AIGA SYMBOL STAIRS DOT SYMBOL ELEVATOR = AIGA SYMBOL ELEVATOR DOT SYMBOL WAITING AREA = AIGA SYMBOL WAITING ROOM DOT SYMBOL QUESTION MARK IN CIRCLE = AIGA SYMBOL INFORMATION DOT SYMBOL BED AND QUESTION MARK IN CIRCLE = AIGA SYMBOL HOTEL INFORMATION DOT SYMBOL AIRPLANE = AIGA SYMBOL AIR TRANSPORTATION DOT SYMBOL HELICOPTER = AIGA SYMBOL HELIPORT DOT SYMBOL TRAIN = AIGA SYMBOL RAIL TRANSPORTATION DOT SYMBOL RIGHT POINTING ARROW = AIGA equivalent of similar name DOT SYMBOL FORWARD AND RIGHT POINTING ARROW = AIGA equivalent of similar name DOT SYMBOL FORWARD POINTING ARROW = AIGA equivalent of similar name DOT SYMBOL FORWARD AND LEFT POINTING ARROW = AIGA equivalent of similar name DOT SYMBOL LEFT POINTING ARROW = AIGA equivalent of similar name DOT SYMBOL DOWNWARD AND LEFT POINTING ARROW = AIGA equivalent of similar name DOT SYMBOL DOWNWARD POINTING ARROW = AIGA equivalent of similar name DOT SYMBOL DOWNWARD AND RIGHT POINTING ARROW = AIGA equivalent of similar name DOT SYMBOL SHIP = AIGA SYMBOL WATER TRANSPORTATION DOT SYMBOL TAXI AND BUS = AIGA SYMBOL ROAD TRANSPORTATION DOT SYMBOL WOMAN = AIGA SYMBOL TOILETS FEMALE DOT SYMBOL CAR AND KEY = AIGA SYMBOL CAR RENTAL DOT SYMBOL KNIFE AND FORK = AIGA SYMBOL RESTUARANT DOT SYMBOL CUP AND SAUCER = AIGA SYMBOL COFFEESHOP DOT SYMBOL COCKTAIL GLASS = AIGA SYMBOL BAR DOT SYMBOL GIFT SHOP [?] = AIGA SYMBOL SHOPS DOT SYMBOL HAIRDRESSER = AIGA SYMBOL BARBER SHOP BEAUTY SALON DOT SYMBOL HAIRDRESSER FOR MEN = AIGA SYMBOL BARBER SHOP DOT SYMBOL HAIRDRESSER FOR WOMEN = AIGA SYMBOL BEAUTY SALON DOT SYMBOL TICKET COUNTER = AIGA SYMBOL TICKET PURCHASE DOT SYMBOL SUITCASE = AIGA SYMBOL BAGGAGE CHECK IN [?] = AIGA SYMBOL BAGGAGE COLLECTION [?] DOT SYMBOL AIRPLANE TAKEOFF [?] = AIGA SYMBOL DEPARTING FLIGHTS DOT SYMBOL MAN WITH SUITCASE WAVING [?] = AIGA SYMBOL ARRIVING FLIGHTS DOT SYMBOL LIT CIGARETTE = AIGA SYMBOL SMOKING DOT SYMBOL NO SMOKING = AIGA SYMBOL NO SMOKING DOT SYMBOL PARKING P = AIGA SYMBOL PARKING DOT SYMBOL NO PARKING = AIGA SYMBOL NO PARKING DOT SYMBOL NO DOGS = AIGA SYMBOL NO DOGS DOT SYMBOL NO ENTRY = AIGA SYMBOL NO ENTRY DOT SYMBOL BLACK CIRCLE DIVIDED BY VERTICAL WHITE LINE [?] = AIGA SYMBOL EXIT DOT SYMBOL FIRE EXTINGUISHER = AIGA SYMBOL FIRE EXTINGUISHER DOT SYMBOL PUTTING LITTER INTO BIN = AIGA SYMBOL LITTER DISPOSAL DOT SYMBOL MAN = AIGA SYMBOL TOILETS MEN DOT SYMBOL UP STAIRCASE = AIGA SYMBOL STAIRS UP DOT SYMBOL DOWN STAIRCASE = AIGA SYMBOL STARIS DOWN DOT SYMBOL NOTE WITH CURRENCY SYMBOLS = AIGA SYMBOL CURRENCY EXCHANGE DOT SYMBOL SWISS CROSS = AIGA SYMBOL FIRST AID DOT SYMBOL SUITCASE IN BOX WITH KEY = AIGA SYMBOL BAGGAGE LOCKERS DOT SYMBOL DOWN ESCALATOR = AIGA SYMBOL ESCALATOR DOWN DOT SYMBOL UP ESCALATOR = AIGA SYMBOL ESCALATOR UP DOT SYMBOL COATHANGER = AIGA SYMBOL COAT CHECK AIGA-only symbols: AIGA SYMBOL CUSTOMS AIGA SYMBOL IMMIGRATION Mere colour-reversed variants of other symbols: DOT SYMBOL RIGHT POINTING ARROW WHITE ON BLACK -- see AIGA black-on-white equivalent DOT SYMBOL FORWARD AND RIGHT POINTING ARROW WHITE ON BLACK -- see AIGA black-on-white equivalent DOT SYMBOL FORWARD POINTING ARROW WHITE ON BLACK -- see AIGA black-on-white equivalent DOT SYMBOL FORWARD AND LEFT POINTING ARROW WHITE ON BLACK -- see AIGA black-on-white equivalent DOT SYMBOL LEFT POINTING ARROW WHITE ON BLACK -- see AIGA black-on-white equivalent DOT SYMBOL DOWNWARD AND LEFT POINTING ARROW WHITE ON BLACK -- see AIGA black-on-white equivalent DOT SYMBOL DOWNWARD POINTING ARROW WHITE ON BLACK -- see AIGA black-on-white equivalent DOT SYMBOL DOWNWARD AND RIGHT POINTING ARROW WHITE ON BLACK -- see AIGA black-on-white equivalent
Re: Suggestion for new dingbats/symbols
On 29/05/13 15:56, Asmus Freytag wrote: On 5/29/2013 1:39 AM, Andreas Stötzner wrote: Am 29.05.2013 um 01:06 schrieb David Starner: And what you'll run into is the fact that people don't agree that that belongs in Unicode. What Andreas was suggesting is rigorous study. I think that is a commendable suggestion. The more interesting question is what aspects should such a study encompass, what are to be its starting points and what kind of conclusions should be possible after it is completed? With better facts in hand it will be much easier to double-check whether currently-held assumptions about their relevance for encoding hold up or need revisiting. Without facts, this kind of discussion just deals in pre-conceived notions, and therefore adds little value. A./ ISO have a technical committee, ISO/TC 145, that deals with graphical symbols, and a standard, ISO 7001, that defines a set of "public information symbols". http://www.iso.org/iso/graphical-symbols_booklet.pdf I can find several sets of public information symbols currently in public use: ISO 7001, DOT, AIGA, and ECOMO. There appear to be * 67 [?] U.S. Department of. Transportation public information pictograms * 50 AIGA symbols: http://www.aiga.org/symbol-signs/ * 125 ECOMO symbols: http://www.ecomo.or.jp/english/picto_top.html There seems to be quite a lot of overlap between all these sets. The 125 ECOMO symbols chosen for unification and standardization were based on a study of around 1200 individual pictograms from 63 different sources: see http://www.accessibletourism.org/?i=enat.en.enat_projects_and_good_practices.307 I'm not sure how many ISO 7001 symbols there are, because the document is not freely publicly available: this press release: http://www.iso.org/iso/home/news_index/news_archive/news.htm?refid=Ref1097 suggests that there were 79 of them in 2007. Unlike universal pictogram schemes like the Noun Project, these public information symbols seem to me to be pretty good candidates for encoding right now. Not only are they capable of being referenced back to authoritative sources for their design and meaning, they are evidently in common use in signs. frequently uses in the same context as text, and in a text-like way. For example, an airport sign might contain the English word for something, the local word for the same thing, and the corresponding public information symbol, all side by side, like a Rosetta stone for pictograms. Moreover, I believe they have clear character-spirit: in many cases, there are different graphical forms of the same symbol from different sets that are manifestly the same semantic entity, in terms of both intended meaning and graphic design intent. With a bit of unification there are probably less than 200 of these to encode, fewer than the emoji. Some of these can be identified with already encoded symbols used elsewhere, and there is also a natural way to use encoding to avoid the need to encode different semantic variants of the same symbol, using combining characters as modifiers to signify that the character following should be put in a warning shape, or overlaid with a circle and diagonal bar to symbolize prohibition. Neil
Re: Suggestion for new dingbats/symbols
On 26/05/13 23:37, Michael Everson wrote: On 26 May 2013, at 23:15, David Starner wrote: Problems from Unicode generally come from of two places; compatibility with non-Unicode data sets, and people with different goals working on it. For pictographs, when Google comes forth saying this is the set we need supported, that was the set they needed supported for compatibility. And then experts in symbols from Germany and Ireland said "We'll accept this incomplete set but we insist on some additions so that the set makes better sense." And that gave us what we have. For instance, the Japanese telco sets had nearly, but not all, the animals in the Asian Zodiacs. The encoded set has all of them however. That's way better than it would have been had we just accepted Google's minimal request. Goals can not be decided in an scientific way, and there are many people who have the goals for Unicode to support text, and not to support an arbitrary set of pictographs. In my experience I have learned that splitters win out over lumpers. Often it takes a long time due to the stubbornness of the lumpers. Michael Everson * http://www.evertype.com/ The Noun Project seem determined to create a pictogram for every noun, and many short phrases: See http://blog.thenounproject.com/ I don't have any statistics about how far they've got to date, but I would imagine that this project is likely to generate at least some tens of thousands of pictograms, just in the near term. -- N.
Re: Private Use Area
On 18/02/13 18:09, William_J_G Overington wrote: The first sentence of section 16.5 is as follows. quote Private-use characters are assigned Unicode code points whose interpretation is not specified by this standard and whose use may be determined by private agreement among cooperating users. end quote Suppose that there is a person, perhaps someone who is trying to produce a font, for whom the Private Use Areas is something that he or she has not encountered before he or she reads that sentence. Is there ambiguity in that sentence such that such a person, a not unreasonable person, could ask himself or herself the following question? Where can I find some cooperating users who will make a private agreement among themselves in order that I can make my font using code points from a Private Use Area? William Overington 18 February 2013 It makes sense to implement something for yourseld first, before you start to recruit people to use it. Produce a font, and some documentation for it. Publicise it. See who uses it. You might want to try Twitter, Facebook, your own website, etc. etc. to do this. There's your group of cooperating users. -- Neil
Re: German »ß«
On 17/02/13 10:48, Philippe Verdy wrote: I was not citing empirical results but things that are regulated by legislation. And your existing empirical results are just nfomal tests ignoring important parts of the population of drivers, notably: - those driving by night : the effet of some visual defects like asygmatism, which is only partially corrected and which can only be compensated by sufficient contrast (lowercase letters do not contrast enough, because their strokes are too near of each other) - the effect of presbytia on vision of aging population : here again the size of letters does matter (look at those phones sold to ages people: most of them are completely unable to use modern smartphones for example, they are unreadable even with the best visual correction), even if they wear "progressive glasses", they have a reduced angle of good focusing, and if letters are too small, they need to stop looking at the road to fix the displays on roads for longer time. Every people above the age of 40 starts suffering this visual defficiency where adaptation to vision depth is more difficult and longer. larger letters that can be read easily even before there's a full focus helps reducing the adaptation time. - also by night, the effect of tireness also slows down the visual adaptation and reduuces the angle of good focusing. In all these cases, you need less density of strokes, and capital letters are better constrasting. Of course there are other factors like the effective constrast of colors used on those displays, the negative impact of too narrow fonts, insufficient intercharacter advance gaps, and insufficient boldness. Note that a perfect 10/10 vision (or better) is not mandatory to drive, there are legal minimums where people with only 8/10 can legally drive (and other visual defects are NOT tested at all, notably the various forms of color blindness (mot cases being full or partial deuteranopia, affecting about 1 on 6-8 male human in Europe, depending on test methods : this is definitely not a small population). Here are some excellent articles about the evidence-based approach that led to the development of current road signage in the United States. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/12/magazine/12fonts-t.html?pagewanted=1&_r=0 and this, on research on the legibility of mixed/lower case vs. ALL CAPS: http://www.microsoft.com/typography/ctfonts/WordRecognition.aspx Regarding Clearview and older drivers, this: http://deldot.gov/information/pubs_forms/manuals/de_mutcd/pdf/20080731061923147.pdf is particularly interesting: the take-home quote is this: The greatest improvement in legibility distance afforded by Clearview was realized by older drivers when viewed under headlamp illumination during nighttime conditions (an increase in legibility distance of between 6.0 percent and 6.8 percent) -- Neil
Re: Mayan numerals
On 16/08/12 16:42, Andreas Prilop wrote: On Wed, 15 Aug 2012, Jameson Quinn wrote: ... I'd like to see at least 20 glyphs for the (horizontal-barred) numerals. ... Do others agree that it's needed? Certainly not. Mayan numerals will disappear after 21 December 2012. I think we can be confident they'll still be worth having, even in the 14th b'ak'tun. -- N.
Re: UTS46 "transitional period"
On 29/06/11 23:25, Chris Weber wrote: On 6/28/2011 11:20 PM, Peter Krefting wrote: Den 2011-06-29 04:41:22 skrev Chris Weber : I was trying to understand the implementation differences in some browsers and registrars. Using your example from UTS46 http://xn--fa-hia.de/ Opera - error, doesn't resolve We have recently implemented support for IDNA 2008 internally, but it was not finished in time for the just recently released Opera 11.50. Our latest greatest internal test build resolves that URL just fine (not that there is much interesting to see). Thanks for the responses Mark and Peter. So do you happen to know if Chrome, Safari, and Firefox are implementing IDNA2008 already or if they punycode example resolves under their implementation of IDNA2003 because of the "murky" processing rules? Best regards, Chris Firefox currently has an open bug for IDNA 2008 implementation: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=479520 -- Neil
Re: Why not just change the glyph of 20A8 RUPEE SIGN?
On 28/07/10 10:22, Shriramana Sharma wrote: This is a somewhat late mail and please forgive me if this question has already been asked but there are too many hits for 20A8 Rupee when searching through the lists. Isn't it possible to just change the glyph of 20A8? To my knowledge, few people actually use 20A8 to display the existing representative glyph. The Rupee sign is what it is -- the sign of India's currency. The character 20A8 encodes that sign. If the Indian Govt decides to change the glyph (in fact it is only now *deciding* on a glyph) then the same character should be maintained with only the glyph changed, no? Unfortunately, that would have undesirable side effects, since there's more than one currency called the "rupee", and presumably some significant number of documents using that symbol: changing the generic rupee sign to look like the Indian rupee sign would make them all appear, misleadingly, to refer to the Indian rupee. There's also the issue of canonical decomposition: the "₨" sign clearly looks like LATIN CAPITAL LETTER R, LATIN SMALL LETTER S -- the Indian rupee sign does not like anything of the sort. -- Neil
