Cyrillic problems

[Steven Hill]

Dear colleagues,

One radical way to cope with the problems that some seem to encounter (trying to "toggle" to Cyrillic font
in order to send E-Mail is Cyrillic),  might be not even to try.   Rather, one could ruthlessly cut the Gordian
knot by using transliteration to the Latin  alphabet. (Pisat' russkie slova latinskimi bukvami.)

At one time I made various attempts at Cyrillic font, but found myself caught between two  fires.  On
the one hand, I found that "Cyrillic Translit" (one of my available settings under "font choices"), worked
perfectly when I wanted to compose a text in Cyrillic, to subsequently PRINT UP MYSELF, as a paper
handout for distribution here.  And it was easy, B/C once I made the setting "Cyrillic Translit,"  I was able
to use the homophonic arrangement of the keys (e.g., ASDFG; Cheh; I-Kratkoe; KL, etc.), which I'd learned
in typing class (USA) years ago.  I can type fast, even "blind,"  with that arrangement, except for the "extra
keys," of course.

But the "Cyrillic Translit" approach had a very serious problem.  If I would send a Cyrillic message  (E-
Mail) to someone who reads Cyrillic,  at the recipient's end my "Cyrillic Translit" emerged as gibberish.
The recipient couldn't make heads  or tails or it. So my homophonic "Cyrillic Translit" arrangement seemed
completely useless for sending E-Mail in  Cyrillic.

On the other hand, I could to opt for a different Cyrillic font setting (I think one such was called "Mozilla
Thunderbird"?) for E-Mail which  COULD be read by recipients who use Cyrillic. But at my end I  faced an
arrangement of keys which was totally unfamiliar to me.  Every  key was in the "wrong place" (for an
American-trained typist) --  I couldn't  type fast or "blind."

If anyone is like me (for E-Mail, I usually use English, which seems to be the lingua franca on computers
nowadays), and if  rather rarely the occasion arises  to send E-Mail in Russian,  one could cut the Gordian
knot,  by transliterating the Russian words into the Latin alphabet.

There are probably better,  less ruthless solutions, known to folks who cope with computers much better
than I do.  (I grew up with Smith-Corona typewriters.)

Cheers,
Steven P Hill,
University of Illinois.
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