<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">On 09/23/2001 07:33:50 AM Andrew Cunningham wrote:<br>
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<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">>> There are more than one code points allocated for the character "A",<br>
>> e.g.,<br>
>> code point U+0041, U+0391, U+0410.<br>
><br>
>true, if you are from the camp that believes that teh Latin "A" is exactly the<br>
>same character as Cyrillic and Greek characters with the same shape.<br>
><br>
>and that would be like trying to collapse all the indic langauges into a single<br>
>script.<br>
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<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">The general rule is that Unicode unifies characters across languages within scripts, but not across scripts.</font>
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<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">>> Earlier in Unicode's history than the present moment, this was not the<br>
>> rule,<br>
>> e.g., code points U+00C0, U+00C1, U+00C2, U+00C3, U+00C4, U+00C5.<br>
>><br>
>> Unicode is a product of its creators and their history. It has warts<br>
>> and<br>
>> inconsistencies. It also has the occasional error.<br>
>><br>
><br>
>also true. from memory the usual explanation given was to enable a simple 1-1<br>
>correspondance and conversion with existing national and international<br>
>standards.<br>
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<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">That is more than the usual explanation -- backward compatibility is the reason that these precomposed characters are included.</font>
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<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">>the current reality is that its very unlikely that additional precomposed<br>
>characters will be encoded, or at leats thats my current understanding. </font>
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<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">Absolutely true.</font>
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<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">>Although<br>
>it isn't relevant to most languages, it is relevant to a range of african<br>
>languages for instance.</font>
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<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">Not once we have software that can handle positioning of Latin combining marks. Our Graphite rendering technology handles that now, as does Apple's AAT. Uniscribe will support this *very soon*.<br>
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<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">- Peter<br>
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Peter Constable<br>
<br>
Non-Roman Script Initiative, SIL International<br>
7500 W. Camp Wisdom Rd., Dallas, TX 75236, USA<br>
Tel: +1 972 708 7485<br>
E-mail: <peter_constable@sil.org><br>
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