Web browser bug for SEA languages

[Doug Cooper]

Dear SEALANGers and SEALTEACHers:

Please take a moment to 'vote' for fixing the following bug
in the next generation of Netscape:

  http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/showvotes.cgi?voteon=33032

  It will take about two minutes.  Enter your e-mail address to
get a password, read the password (it's mailed to you right
away), then enter it and cast 1 vote.  It's fast, easy, and important.

  Right now, the zero-width space character ​ -- it lets
a browser know that it can insert a carriage return in writing
systems like Thai, Lao, Burmese, Khmer, and others
across SEA -- is broken.  Even though this 'character' doesn't
really exist, the Web browser tries to find it on the current font,
and will incorrectly print a "?" if it's not there.

  The bug fix will hard-wire this character into the browser, so
that it always works correctly.  The cost of _not_ fixing this bug
is that non-segmented writing systems may not display properly.

  Note the the traditional way of dealing with this (the <WBR> tag)
-- has its own problems (formally, it's an 'obsolete feature' that
was removed from the latest versions of Netscape, and could
conceivably be removed from all browsers).  I've been pleading
this case on a separate front; it now appears the tag will be part
of the next version (and with the doesn't-work-in-tables bug
fixed as well).

  Again, please take a minute to vote for the bug -- it's nearly
painless, costs nothing, and helps show the world that the
linguists of SEA are a force not to be taken lightly ;-).

  Thanks,
  Doug Cooper

__________________________________________________
          1425 VP Tower, 21/45 Soi Chawakun
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    doug at th.net (662) 246-8946  fax (662) 246-8789

  Southeast Asian Software Research Center, Bangkok
  http://seasrc.th.net         -->  SEASRC Web site
  http://seasrc.th.net/sealang --> SEALANG Web site