Improved e-Mail Fonts (was RE: Funny looking characters)

[Koontz John E]

On Sun, 25 Mar 2001, Rankin, Robert L wrote:
> I have a naive question for John and other computer whizzes. If each of us
> on the list set our email programs to use a particular font (say, Siouan
> SILDoulos or Iroquoian-ABC or whatever we chose as a group), would it enable
> each of us to use "real" nasal vowels, accented chanacters, sibilants with
> haceks, etc. in our postings to the list, or does this depend on servers,
> ISP's, etc.?

In principle yes, but I think most mail is still transferred using SMTP
(Simple Mail Transfer Protocol) programs, and these might allow for
traslation of characters sets (outside the ASCCI range or even the 96
printable characters within ASCII range).  This used to be a standard
difficulty with email.  I'm not sure if it is still true.  I don't hear
people talking about it, so perhaps it isn't.

Whether or not the transfer mechanism is not a problem, there would be a
problem with the viewing tool, the mail program.  I suspect that most
Windows-based mail programs could handle the matter as Bob suggests, but
this would be less feasible with Unix-based mailers, because the fonts in
question are not available in Unix-supported font formats.  There are also
two other environments to consider.  One is the basic telnet window
environment, which, by a perhaps curious odd turn of events, is what I am
using.  The other is that of individuals viewing the archives as Web files
(which works out to be Windows with MSIE and Netscape - not problems) and
Netscape (etc?) under Unix).  I see I have overlooked Mac environments,
but I think, barring the necessrity for translating the TrueType fonts
into Mac format, they are pretty much a case with Windows users in this
respect.

If we assume no transfer protocol problems, then it all turns on whether
we could agree on a font and agree to use systems and mailers that can
handle that font.

I think a certain amount of discussion on the subject might be
appropriate, but if the general trend seems to be to stick with the status
quo, I think we should not overdo it, though obviously this is an issue
that can be raised fairly from time to time.

Incidentally, I had been hoping to be able to distribute the "Standard"
Siouan fonts in a format usable with Web pages soon, but this has had to
be postponed for a while for personal reasons.

JEK