Re: When to use markup: (Was:Introducing the idea of a ROMAN VARIANT SELECTOR (was: Re: Proposing Fraktur))
- Original Message - From: Asmus Freytag [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Karl Pentzlin [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: den 31 januari 2002 22:09 Subject: When to use markup: (Was:Introducing the idea of a ROMAN VARIANT SELECTOR (was: Re: Proposing Fraktur)) A more productive distinction would be along these lines: a) is the feature necessary for correctly expressing the content Yes. b) is the feature rule based, and Yes. b.1) is the rule implementable w/o knowledge of semantics, or No. c) when implementing the feature, is it necessary to c.1) provide scope information, or Yes. c.2) is local context sufficient No. Leaving out italics from a document can not only change the level of emphasis, but for example in English, there are occasional circumstances where the use of italics removes a possible ambiguity in interpreting a sentence. Nevertheless (except for mathematics) italics were left to a higher level protocol (style markup). Italics is better supported than Fraktur, as most word processors have an option for using italics with any font installed on the computer. For Fraktur one has to use a different font. There is no Fraktur font widely spread on all Windows computers or something like that, so it's almost impossible to using Fraktur text in any public document or similar w/o using bitmaps. Why was Fraktur supported for mathematics, but not for old Swedish/German/etc.? Stefan _ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com
Re: When to use markup: (Was:Introducing the idea of a ROMAN VARIANT SELECTOR (was: Re: Proposing Fraktur))
- Original Message - From: Asmus Freytag [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Karl Pentzlin [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: den 31 januari 2002 22:09 Subject: When to use markup: (Was:Introducing the idea of a ROMAN VARIANT SELECTOR (was: Re: Proposing Fraktur)) A more productive distinction would be along these lines: a) is the feature necessary for correctly expressing the content Yes. b) is the feature rule based, and Yes. b.1) is the rule implementable w/o knowledge of semantics, or No. c) when implementing the feature, is it necessary to c.1) provide scope information, or Yes. c.2) is local context sufficient No. Leaving out italics from a document can not only change the level of emphasis, but for example in English, there are occasional circumstances where the use of italics removes a possible ambiguity in interpreting a sentence. Nevertheless (except for mathematics) italics were left to a higher level protocol (style markup). Italics is better supported than Fraktur, as most word processors have an option for using italics with any font installed on the computer. For Fraktur one has to use a different font. There is no Fraktur font widely spread on all Windows computers or something like that, so it's almost impossible to use Fraktur text in any public document or similar w/o using bitmaps to displaying the characters. Why was Fraktur supported for mathematics, but not for old Swedish/German/etc.? Stefan _ Do You Yahoo!? Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com
Re: When to use markup: (Was:Introducing the idea of a ROMAN VARIANT SELECTOR (was: Re: Proposing Fraktur))
At 07:35 2/3/2002, Stefan Persson wrote: Italics is better supported than Fraktur, as most word processors have an option for using italics with any font installed on the computer. For Fraktur one has to use a different font. Um, for italics one has to use a different font also. Many programs provide an italics button that activates the italic member of a font family, but this still involves selecting a separate font. There is no Fraktur font widely spread on all Windows computers or something like that, so it's almost impossible to using Fraktur text in any public document or similar w/o using bitmaps. There are plenty of Fraktur and other blackletter fonts available. Many of the best ones are available from Linotype in Germany. If you think that a Fraktur font should come installed on operating systems, you should petition your OS developer. I don't see that these font availability issues have anything to do with Unicode. John Hudson Tiro Typeworks www.tiro.com Vancouver, BC [EMAIL PROTECTED] ... es ist ein unwiederbringliches Bild der Vergangenheit, das mit jeder Gegenwart zu verschwinden droht, die sich nicht in ihm gemeint erkannte. ... every image of the past that is not recognized by the present as one of its own concerns threatens to disappear irretrievably. Walter Benjamin
Re: When to use markup: (Was:Introducing the idea of a ROMAN VARIANT SELECTOR (was: Re: Proposing Fraktur))
From: John Hudson [EMAIL PROTECTED] Um, for italics one has to use a different font also. Many programs provide an italics button that activates the italic member of a font family, but this still involves selecting a separate font. Au contraire, sir! Many fonts *do* have a separate .TTF files for the italic version, bu there are just as many that do not, yet the italic option does not find itself disabled in programs. MichKa Michael Kaplan Trigeminal Software, Inc. -- http://www.trigeminal.com/
Re: When to use markup: (Was:Introducing the idea of a ROMAN VARIANT SELECTOR (was: Re: Proposing Fraktur))
At 10:25 AM 2/3/02, John Hudson wrote: Um, for italics one has to use a different font also. Many programs provide an italics button that activates the italic member of a font family, but this still involves selecting a separate font. And it would be simple to set up a font family so that Fraktur would be the normal state, and the italic button on the word processor would select a Roman member of the family (if you still needed sloped italics, those could be assigned to the bold italic slot). -- Curtis Clark http://www.csupomona.edu/~jcclark/ Mockingbird Font Works http://www.mockfont.com/
Re: When to use markup: (Was:Introducing the idea of a ROMAN VARIANT SELECTOR (was: Re: Proposing Fraktur))
At 10:55 2/3/2002, Michael \(michka\) Kaplan wrote: Um, for italics one has to use a different font also. Many programs provide an italics button that activates the italic member of a font family, but this still involves selecting a separate font. Au contraire, sir! Many fonts *do* have a separate .TTF files for the italic version, bu there are just as many that do not, yet the italic option does not find itself disabled in programs. Ah. Those 'italics'. Those are not italics. Those are slanted romans. Sorry, I thought we were talking about typography. In Adobe InDesign, the italic function is disabled if an italic font is not available. There is a separate control for slanting text, but it is not possible to accidentally produce a sloped roman in the absence of an italic font. This is how it should be. John Hudson Tiro Typeworks www.tiro.com Vancouver, BC [EMAIL PROTECTED] ... es ist ein unwiederbringliches Bild der Vergangenheit, das mit jeder Gegenwart zu verschwinden droht, die sich nicht in ihm gemeint erkannte. ... every image of the past that is not recognized by the present as one of its own concerns threatens to disappear irretrievably. Walter Benjamin
When to use markup: (Was:Introducing the idea of a ROMAN VARIANT SELECTOR (was: Re: Proposing Fraktur))
At 09:42 AM 1/30/02 +0100, Karl Pentzlin wrote: The question is, are typesetting rules part of the script? (I mean rules in the sense of obligatory regulations, not guidelines). This distinction is a very German way of approaching the question. If yes, (in my opinion) the plain text must carry the information that is needed to follow them. If no, their execution can be left to higher level protocols (which then have to decide whether a word is a foreign word [to be set in Roman letters] or a name [to be set in Fraktur letters], such at least according to German typesetting rules). A more productive distinction would be along these lines: a) is the feature necessary for correctly expressing the content b) is the feature rule based, and b.1) is the rule implementable w/o knowledge of semantics, or c) when implementing the feature, is it necessary to c.1) provide scope information, or c.2) is local context sufficient Looking at this list, roughly in reverse order: Higher level protocols, understood as markup languages in particular, do really well, when implementing something requires defining a scope, since in them, all text data and the effect of all syntax are scoped already. If layout features can be determined algorithmically, it makes little sense to add what can be derived from the existing text data, also into the markup. Allowing for duplicate representation of information, always allows the possibility of something getting out of step. If semantic knowledge is required to implement a feature, this knowledge must be supplied. If the extra information can be expressed as point-like, local context, then it makes much *less* sense to use higher level markup compared to character codes. Character codes, in a way, provide the ideal representation of point like context in a data stream. Finally, we get back to the original argument. Whether a typesetting rule (and by rule I mean both conventions and legislated rules) is supported by information added to the plain text or not, does not depend on whether a national authority promulgates it, or whether it just represents the consensus of the users of the language. If, in practice, such a rule can be ignored, yet not change the meaning of the text, it's a good candidate for not being implemented via plain text. However, this is not absolute: Leaving out italics from a document can not only change the level of emphasis, but for example in English, there are occasional circumstances where the use of italics removes a possible ambiguity in interpreting a sentence. Nevertheless (except for mathematics) italics were left to a higher level protocol (style markup). Overriding bad hyphenation, or bad line breaks, is supported by SHY and NBSP, even though hyphenation is not required at all to express the content of a text, nor would bad line breaks e.g. after Dr. change the meaning of the text. In the latter two cases, character codes were added (fairly early) to plain text, because using point-like context to support these very common algorithms (hyphenation and linebreak) is an elegant solution, while adding markup for the same purpose would be inelegant to the extreme. Like everything else in character encoding, there are shades of gray, and levels of gradation, so not everything is clear cut. But recognizing up front that character codes may legitimately serve the support of algorithms, even where the feature implemented by the algorithm is merely common, and not absolutely and minimally required, is useful. A./
Re: When to use markup: (Was:Introducing the idea of a ROMAN VARIANT SELECTOR(was: Re: Proposing Fraktur))
.. about Fraktur vs. Roman being a codepoint difference rather than a markup difference.. Like everything else in character encoding, there are shades of gray, and levels of gradation, so not everything is clear cut. But recognizing up front that character codes may legitimately serve the support of algorithms, even where the feature implemented by the algorithm is merely common, and not absolutely and minimally required, is useful. A./ かたかなむようぞ！ひらがなをつかえる！！ I DON'T NEED LOWERCASE! I CAN USE CAPITAL LETTERS! → じゅういっちゃん ← だんせいらしさむよう _ インターネットをぶらぶらショッピングするならMSN ショッピングへ http://shopping.msn.co.jp/
