Unicode, accent marks, and OCS

[Richard Robin]

Dear SEELANGovtsy,

There is news on the Unicode front:

OCS SUPPORT. Unicode does support OCS, although font designers and keyboard
programmers might not have responded yet to the high market demand for OCS
support. Specifically, the code range for "historical Cyrillic" is 0460 to
0485 (See http://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U0400.pdf). Unicode also gives
full support to Cyrillic characters from languages other than Russian.

ACCENT MARKS.  There are three ways to support accent marks with Unicode.

1.  Create a special accent font set just for accented characters. To do
this, in a Unicode capable font editor (such as Font Lab) create a single
font with all of the accented vowels you need (9 in Russian). Make sure that
the vowel characters match the Unicode numbers of the vowels in question.
That way Russian spellecheckers will recognize them as the Russian vowels
they are meant to represent. This is how I personally do accent marks (but
in Windows only). PLUSSES: (a) This works in all Windows programs (not just
Word or Word Perfect). (b) Spellcheckers accept accented words. MINUSES: (a)
You have to create a macro for each program that you use to have easy
keystroke access to the accent marks. (b) While the fint prints great, it
looks ugly on the screen. (c) Some network printers don't print this font.
(d) It's feasible to have only one kind of accent mark (in most cases acute
accents). Grave and circumflexes make the system too cumbersome.

2.  Use Unicode's built-in overstrike diacritics. Windows Word97 and 2000
(and I imagine for the Mac as well) give you access to a great many Unicode
overstrike characters. (Look under Insert Symbol and then scroll through the
symbols until you get to the "combining diacritical mark" set). You can
automate the process by assigning a keystroke to each diacrtical. PLUSSES
(a) You need no extra fonts. (b) I imagine it's doable on the Mac - at least
in later versions of Word. (c) It should print on all printers. (d) It
looks pretty on the screen. MINUS (and for me a big one): It causes Russian
spellcheckers to flag any accented word.

3.  Use Word's formula editor to create inline composite characters. See the
Word help menu on EQ fields. This shows you how to place an accent mark on
top of another character in an equation. You can then automate the process
by recording a macro. (Or I can send you the text of the macro that I
wrote.) PLUSSES: It works even with non Unicode fonts. MINUSES: (a) Word
highlights such formulas on the screen (ugly) but not in print. (b) Like
solution 2, it confuses Russian spellcheckers.


----- Original Message -----
From: "Yoshimasa Tsuji" <yamato at YT.CACHE.WASEDA.AC.JP>
To: <SEELANGS at LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU>
Sent: Wednesday, February 07, 2001 11:59 PM
Subject: Re: Mac MS Word 98 and Russian


>I have been frustrated with Word 98 precisely because it is based on
>Unicode, which is fine for general purposes but lousy for ours.
>Specifically, Unicode doesn't contain accented vowels or exiled characters
>like the jat' or izhitsa.  To my knowledge there is also no Unicode
>standard for Church Slavonic.  This is a case where a growing adoption of
>the industry standard may leave us higher and drier than we were before.

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