Re: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script
On 10/09/2011 04:53, delex r wrote: I figure out that Unicode has not addressed the sovereignty issues of a language while trying to devise an ASCII like encoding system for almost all the characters and symbols used on earth. . The Unicode encodes writing systems not languages - it certainly has nothing to do with the sovereignty issues of a language - nor should it. There are many characters encoded in the Latin blocks that were never used for writing the Latin Language and similarly there are characters encoded in the Arabic block only used for writing Persian not Arabic. Characters only used for writing Assamese in the Bengali block is similar. As long as you can type all the characters necessary for writing your language, don't worry about names.
Re: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script
On Sat, Sep 10, 2011 at 02:02:09AM +, Doug Ewell wrote: English, French, German, Dutch, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Swedish, and Polish are all different languages. Each has its own pronunciation, vocabulary, orthography, national identity, and rich literary tradition. Would you suggest that the letters used in each of these languages should be encoded separately? That would be the best :). People would stop pretending they are able to read/write the language of the other one : -- Petr Tomasek http://www.etf.cuni.cz/~tomasek Jabber: but...@jabbim.cz EA 355:001 DU DU DU DU EA 355:002 TU TU TU TU EA 355:003 NU NU NU NU NU NU NU EA 355:004 NA NA NA NA NA
Re: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script
Hi Unicode Community! I recommend to Unicode that this grievance is taken into account. No one consonant in this code range is used by only one language. Refer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Nagari_alphabet#Consonants The Indian census of 1961 recognised 1,652 different languages in India (including languages not native to the subcontinent). The 1991 census recognizes 1,576 classified mother tongues. Refer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_India#Inventories. The Eastern Nagari script is an Abugida system of writing belonging to the Brahmic family of scripts whose use is associated with the Assamese, Bengali, Bishnupriya Manipuri, Maithili, Mising, Meitei Manipuri, Sylheti, and Chittagonian languages. Refer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Nagari_alphabet The Bengali alphabet (Bengali: বাংলা লিপি bangla lipi or Bengali: বঙ্গলিপি bôņgôlipi) is the writing system for the Bengali language. The same script is the basis for the Assamese, Meitei, Bishnupriya Manipuri, Kokborok, Garo and Mundari alphabets. All these languages are spoken in the eastern region of South Asia. Refer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengali_alphabet I propose to Unicode that it renames this code range as Eastern Nagari or East(ern) South Asian Script. Regards, Anbu Kaveeswarar Selvaraju On Sat, 10 Sep 2011 02:44:59 +0200, Kent Karlsson kent.karlsso...@telia.com wrote: Den 2011-09-10 00:53, skrev delex r del...@indiatimes.com: I figure out that Unicode has not addressed the sovereignty issues of a language Which, I daresay, is irrelevant from a *character* encoding perspective. while trying to devise an ASCII like encoding system for almost all the characters and symbols used on earth. I am continuing with my observation of the glaring mistake done by Unicode by naming a South Asian Script as ³Bengali². Here I would like to give certain information that I think will be of some help for Unicode in its endeavour to faithfully represent a Universal Character encoding standard truer to even micro-facts. India is believed to have at least 1652 mother tongues out of which only 22 One list of languages in India is given in http://www.ethnologue.com/show_country.asp?name=IN (I did not count the number of entries) are recognized by the Indian Constitution as official languages for administrative communication among local governments and to the citizens. And the constitution has not explicitly recognized any official script. As Unicode has listed the languages and scripts, the Indian Constitution has also listed Unicode does not list any languages at all. Ok, the CLDR subproject copies a list of language codes from the IANA language subtag registry, which (in a complex manner) takes its language codes from (among others) the ISO 639-3 registry, which largely is in sync with Ethnologue (as in the list above); but I guess that is not what you referred to. the official languages ( In its 8th schedule). The first entry in that list is the Assamese language. Assamese is a sovereign language with its own grammar Which I don't think is in dispute at all. and ³script² that contains some unique characters that you will not find in any of the scripts so far discovered by Unicode. At least 30 million people Unicode (at this stage) does not do any discovery. Unicode and ISO/IEC 10646 is driven by applications (proposals) to encode characters (and define properties of characters). call it the ³Assamese Script² and if provided with computers and internet If you want to disunify the Bengali script (and characters) from Assamese, you need to show, in a proposal document, that they really are different scripts, and should not be unified as just different uses of the same script. connection can bomb the Unicode e-mail address with confirmations. These Hmm, an email bombing threat... I'm sure Sarasvati can find a way to block those (or we may all simply file them away as spam). characters are, I repeat, the one that is given a Hexcode 09F0 and the other with 09F1 by this universal character encoding system but unfortunat! ely has described both as ³Bengali² Ra etc. etc. I don¹t know who has advised Unicode to use the tag ³Bengali² to name the block that includes these two characters. If you are not an Indian then just google an image of an Indian Currency note. There on one side of the note you will find a box inside which the value of the currency note is written in words in at least 15 scripts of official Indian languages.( I don¹t know why it is not 22). At the top , the script is Assamese as Assamese is the first officially recognized language (script?) . Next below it you will find almost similar shapes. That is in Bengali. India officially recognises the distinction between these two scripts which although shaped similar but sounds very different at many points. And the standard Minor font differences is not a
Re: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script
Anbu Kaveeswarar Selvaraju anbu at peoplestring dot com wrote: The Bengali alphabet (Bengali: বাংলা লিপি bangla lipi or Bengali: বঙ্গলিপি bôņgôlipi) is the writing system for the Bengali language. The same script is the basis for the Assamese, Meitei, Bishnupriya Manipuri, Kokborok, Garo and Mundari alphabets. All these languages are spoken in the eastern region of South Asia. Refer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengali_alphabet I propose to Unicode that it renames this code range as Eastern Nagari or East(ern) South Asian Script. You're not listening. Block names in Unicode do not denote languages. -- Doug Ewell | Thornton, Colorado, USA | RFC 5645, 4645, UTN #14 www.ewellic.org | www.facebook.com/doug.ewell | @DougEwell
RE: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script
Once a script is encoded, the reference name used in the Standard for the script becomes part of stable character identifiers that _cannot be changed_. This is not just Unicode policy; this is policy of ISO JTC1/SC2. The reference name Bengali for the script in question cannot be changed. The most that could be done would be to add a comment indicating that the script is also known as Eastern Nagari or that the script is used for Assamese, Manipuri, and other languages as well as the Bengali language. But, in fact, the Standard already says this--see TUS 6.1, section 9.2, page 985 (http://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode6.0.0/ch09.pdf): quote 9.2 Bengali (Bangla) Bengali: U+0980–U+09FF The Bengali script is a North Indian script closely related to Devanagari. It is used to write the Bengali language primarily in the West Bengal state and in the nation of Bangladesh. In India and Bangladesh, the preferred name for the script and the language is Bangla. The script is also used to write Assamese in Assam and a number of other minority languages, such as Bishnupriya Manipuri, Daphla, Garo, Hallam, Khasi, Mizo, Munda, Naga, Rian, and Santali, in northeastern India. /quote If there is any reasonable revision to this informative text that you think would improve it, you should submit that feedback; you can do that using the online feedback mechanism at http://www.unicode.org/reporting.html. Peter -Original Message- From: unicode-bou...@unicode.org [mailto:unicode-bou...@unicode.org] On Behalf Of a...@peoplestring.com Sent: Saturday, September 10, 2011 2:09 AM To: kent.karlsso...@telia.com Cc: del...@indiatimes.com; unicode@unicode.org Subject: Re: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script Hi Unicode Community! I recommend to Unicode that this grievance is taken into account. No one consonant in this code range is used by only one language. Refer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Nagari_alphabet#Consonants The Indian census of 1961 recognised 1,652 different languages in India (including languages not native to the subcontinent). The 1991 census recognizes 1,576 classified mother tongues. Refer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_India#Inventories. The Eastern Nagari script is an Abugida system of writing belonging to the Brahmic family of scripts whose use is associated with the Assamese, Bengali, Bishnupriya Manipuri, Maithili, Mising, Meitei Manipuri, Sylheti, and Chittagonian languages. Refer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Nagari_alphabet The Bengali alphabet (Bengali: বাংলা লিপি bangla lipi or Bengali: বঙ্গলিপি bôņgôlipi) is the writing system for the Bengali language. The same script is the basis for the Assamese, Meitei, Bishnupriya Manipuri, Kokborok, Garo and Mundari alphabets. All these languages are spoken in the eastern region of South Asia. Refer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengali_alphabet I propose to Unicode that it renames this code range as Eastern Nagari or East(ern) South Asian Script. Regards, Anbu Kaveeswarar Selvaraju On Sat, 10 Sep 2011 02:44:59 +0200, Kent Karlsson kent.karlsso...@telia.com wrote: Den 2011-09-10 00:53, skrev delex r del...@indiatimes.com: I figure out that Unicode has not addressed the sovereignty issues of a language Which, I daresay, is irrelevant from a *character* encoding perspective. while trying to devise an ASCII like encoding system for almost all the characters and symbols used on earth. I am continuing with my observation of the glaring mistake done by Unicode by naming a South Asian Script as ³Bengali². Here I would like to give certain information that I think will be of some help for Unicode in its endeavour to faithfully represent a Universal Character encoding standard truer to even micro-facts. India is believed to have at least 1652 mother tongues out of which only 22 One list of languages in India is given in http://www.ethnologue.com/show_country.asp?name=IN (I did not count the number of entries) are recognized by the Indian Constitution as official languages for administrative communication among local governments and to the citizens. And the constitution has not explicitly recognized any official script. As Unicode has listed the languages and scripts, the Indian Constitution has also listed Unicode does not list any languages at all. Ok, the CLDR subproject copies a list of language codes from the IANA language subtag registry, which (in a complex manner) takes its language codes from (among others) the ISO 639-3 registry, which largely is in sync with Ethnologue (as in the list above); but I guess that is not what you referred to. the official languages ( In its 8th schedule). The first entry in that list is the Assamese language. Assamese is a sovereign language with its own grammar Which I don't think is in dispute at all. and ³script² that contains some unique characters
Re: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script
On Sat, 10 Sep 2011 12:33:47 +0600 Chridtopher Fynn chris.f...@gmail.com wrote: Characters only used for writing Assamese in the Bengali block is similar. As long as you can type all the characters necessary for writing your language, don't worry about names. Actually, names sometimes matter. If one is forced to use a pick list when typing, it is helpful to see the name of the character if the pick list displays the character poorly. However, apart from a few totally confusing howlers (especially in Lao), that is largely an internationalisation issue. In this context, though, it is probably best to mutter, 'Unicode idiots call the Assamese script Bengali' rather than totally confuse people. (I presume the Assamese are happy with the concept that Bengali uses the Assamese script.) Secondly, some people need to be able to type other people's languages - a great many people need to be able to type English! I imagine Anbu needs to work with several scripts. Richard.
Re: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script
On 09/09/2011 08:12 PM, Peter Constable wrote (responding to del...@indiatimes.com): Thus, what you refer to as a glaring mistake is not a mistake at all when considered in relation to what the intent and usage within the Standard is--and what it is _not_. More significantly, it doesn't even matter if it *is* a mistake. Bringing evidence and trying to prove that you are correct is not relevant. Even if you are completely right and everyone can see it, Unicode *still* isn't going to change its names. If they won't even correct a misspelling, a single-letter transposition, they are not going to make other changes. Stop trying to tell us why you are right. We can concede that you are, and it doesn't matter. ~mark
RE: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script
You appear to be assuming that Unicode lists languages. It does not. It deals with characters and scripts. As mentioned before, it does not attempt to document all possible and preferred ways to refer to characters or scripts; that is well beyond the scope, purpose and requirements. All that Unicode does is provide a standard and universally-available means of encoding text--whatever text for whatever language, and referred to by whatever communities in whichever ways they may choose. To achieve that, it must adopt _some_ name for characters and scripts for reference purposes so that implementers of the standard have some way to refer to those things unambiguously. But that does not at all mean that _everybody_ is assumed to use those same terms, or even to think of collections of characters in the same way that Unicode uses the notion of script. With that in mind, Bengali is used in the Unicode standard purely as an unambiguous way to refer to a particular collection of characters that are related in history and current conventional usage (across multiple language communities) and that share certain graphic and behavioural characteristics. It is mainly historical coincidence that Bengali is the term used in the Standard; as Doug Ewell and John Jenkins explained in other mail, these terms were adopted within the Standard based on how such collections are most typically referred to in English-language discussion. The term is being used to reference a collection of characters--a script--and not a language, and there is no intent whatsoever to suggest that any particular language should be considered to have any particular status relative to any other language. Thus, what you refer to as a glaring mistake is not a mistake at all when considered in relation to what the intent and usage within the Standard is--and what it is _not_. Peter -Original Message- From: unicode-bou...@unicode.org [mailto:unicode-bou...@unicode.org] On Behalf Of delex r Sent: Friday, September 09, 2011 3:54 PM To: unicode@unicode.org Subject: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script I figure out that Unicode has not addressed the sovereignty issues of a language while trying to devise an ASCII like encoding system for almost all the characters and symbols used on earth. I am continuing with my observation of the glaring mistake done by Unicode by naming a South Asian Script as “Bengali”. Here I would like to give certain information that I think will be of some help for Unicode in its endeavour to faithfully represent a Universal Character encoding standard truer to even micro-facts. India is believed to have at least 1652 mother tongues out of which only 22 are recognized by the Indian Constitution as official languages for administrative communication among local governments and to the citizens. And the constitution has not explicitly recognized any official script. As Unicode has listed the languages and scripts, the Indian Constitution has also listed the official languages ( In its 8th schedule). The first entry in that list is the Assamese language. Assamese is a sovereign language with its own grammar and “script” that contains some unique characters that you will not find in any of the scripts so far discovered by Unicode. At least 30 million people call it the “Assamese Script” and if provided with computers and internet connection can bomb the Unicode e-mail address with confirmations. These characters are, I repeat, the one that is given a Hexcode 09F0 and the other with 09F1 by this universal character encoding system but unfortunat! ely has described both as “Bengali” Ra etc. etc. I don’t know who has advised Unicode to use the tag “Bengali” to name the block that includes these two characters. If you are not an Indian then just google an image of an Indian Currency note. There on one side of the note you will find a box inside which the value of the currency note is written in words in at least 15 scripts of official Indian languages.( I don’t know why it is not 22). At the top , the script is Assamese as Assamese is the first officially recognized language (script?) . Next below it you will find almost similar shapes. That is in Bengali. India officially recognises the distinction between these two scripts which although shaped similar but sounds very different at many points. And the standard assamese alphabet set has extra characters which are never bengali just like London is never in Germany. Coming again to the Hexcodes 09F0 (Raw) and 09F1 (wabo). Both have nothing Bengali in them and interestingly 09F1 ( sounds WO or WA when used within words) has even nothing ‘Ra’ sound in it. Thus you know, with actual Bengali alphabet set one can’t write anything to produce the sound “Watt” as in James Watt and instead need to combine three alphabets but even then only to sound like “ OOYAT “ in Bengali itself. Therefore
Re: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script
Den 2011-09-10 00:53, skrev delex r del...@indiatimes.com: I figure out that Unicode has not addressed the sovereignty issues of a language Which, I daresay, is irrelevant from a *character* encoding perspective. while trying to devise an ASCII like encoding system for almost all the characters and symbols used on earth. I am continuing with my observation of the glaring mistake done by Unicode by naming a South Asian Script as ³Bengali². Here I would like to give certain information that I think will be of some help for Unicode in its endeavour to faithfully represent a Universal Character encoding standard truer to even micro-facts. India is believed to have at least 1652 mother tongues out of which only 22 One list of languages in India is given in http://www.ethnologue.com/show_country.asp?name=IN (I did not count the number of entries) are recognized by the Indian Constitution as official languages for administrative communication among local governments and to the citizens. And the constitution has not explicitly recognized any official script. As Unicode has listed the languages and scripts, the Indian Constitution has also listed Unicode does not list any languages at all. Ok, the CLDR subproject copies a list of language codes from the IANA language subtag registry, which (in a complex manner) takes its language codes from (among others) the ISO 639-3 registry, which largely is in sync with Ethnologue (as in the list above); but I guess that is not what you referred to. the official languages ( In its 8th schedule). The first entry in that list is the Assamese language. Assamese is a sovereign language with its own grammar Which I don't think is in dispute at all. and ³script² that contains some unique characters that you will not find in any of the scripts so far discovered by Unicode. At least 30 million people Unicode (at this stage) does not do any discovery. Unicode and ISO/IEC 10646 is driven by applications (proposals) to encode characters (and define properties of characters). call it the ³Assamese Script² and if provided with computers and internet If you want to disunify the Bengali script (and characters) from Assamese, you need to show, in a proposal document, that they really are different scripts, and should not be unified as just different uses of the same script. connection can bomb the Unicode e-mail address with confirmations. These Hmm, an email bombing threat... I'm sure Sarasvati can find a way to block those (or we may all simply file them away as spam). characters are, I repeat, the one that is given a Hexcode 09F0 and the other with 09F1 by this universal character encoding system but unfortunat! ely has described both as ³Bengali² Ra etc. etc. I don¹t know who has advised Unicode to use the tag ³Bengali² to name the block that includes these two characters. If you are not an Indian then just google an image of an Indian Currency note. There on one side of the note you will find a box inside which the value of the currency note is written in words in at least 15 scripts of official Indian languages.( I don¹t know why it is not 22). At the top , the script is Assamese as Assamese is the first officially recognized language (script?) . Next below it you will find almost similar shapes. That is in Bengali. India officially recognises the distinction between these two scripts which although shaped similar but sounds very different at many points. And the standard Minor font differences is not a reason for disunification. Different pronunciations of the same letters is not a reason for disunification either. Just think of how many different ways Latin letters (and letter combinations) are pronounced in different languages (x, j, h, v, w, f, ...; even a gets different pronunciation in British English vs. US English, and that is within the same language...; and most orthographies aren't very accurately phonetic anyway, with quite a bit of varying (contextual and dialectal) pronunciation for the letters). assamese alphabet set has extra characters which are never bengali just like London is never in Germany. There are 8 London in the USA, two in Canada, one in Kiribati, ... ;-) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_(disambiguation)) Coming again to the Hexcodes 09F0 (Raw) and 09F1 (wabo). Both have nothing Bengali in them and interestingly 09F1 ( sounds WO or WA when used within words) has even nothing Ra¹ sound in it. Thus you know, with actual Bengali alphabet set one can¹t write anything to produce the sound ³Watt² as in James Watt and instead need to combine three alphabets but even then only to sound like ³ OOYAT ³ in Bengali itself. Yes, English has a rather peculiar pronunciation for the letter W... ;-) Several languages will pronounce Watt (without changing the spelling) as Vatt, and regard that as a normal pronunciation of Watt. Therefore Unicode must consider terming the block range as ³Assamese²
Re: Continue:Glaring mistake in the code list for South Asian Script
English, French, German, Dutch, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Swedish, and Polish are all different languages. Each has its own pronunciation, vocabulary, orthography, national identity, and rich literary tradition. Would you suggest that the letters used in each of these languages should be encoded separately? -- Doug Ewell • d...@ewellic.org Sent via BlackBerry by ATT
