AW: signwriting resolution/Malta

[Valerie Sutton]

SignWriting List
December 4, 2002

>I think all of us who deal with teaching how to handle the technical
>questions could take advantage out of these questions and your answers ? At
>least I try to learn more about this ... Stefan ;-)


Hello Stefan and Everyone -
Ok. I didn't want to burden you all with the frustrations....But below is my answer to Maria...

Do you have TrueType Fonts, Stefan, for every symbol in SignWriting?...not complete signs but individual symbols? if not, then we are stuck with 72 dots per inch right now...And SignWriting Unicode will take years of development. And SignWriter Java is only working on Macintosh OS X right now. Here is my answer to Maria:

To: maria.azzopardi at UM.EDU.MT
From: Valerie Sutton <Sutton at SignWriting.org>
Subject: signwriting resolution/Malta

Hello Maria!
Thanks so much for writing about your project - it sounds wonderful!

The SignWriting documents are at 72 dots per inch at this time...that is correct. And even though I have a computer program called SignWriter Java, that has improved symbols, they are still 72 dots per inch, because they are bitmaps etc.... Technically all of your documents can be converted to "better looking graphics" at 72 dots per inch right now with SignWriter Java on a Macintosh, but you would have a huge job to fix up the document at this late date...and I bet you will feel pretty overwhelmed...so perhaps your printer-person is simply being a good artist, and doesn't understand the fact that Chinese and SignWriting were written by hand for decades.... Chinese now has a way to be typed, and SignWriting does too, but our screen resolution is not as good, because we are a little behind the Roman alphabet in type resolution - But in a few years time, this issue will be gone for SignWriting...but history has nothing to do with your problem, which is "right now"...So if you !
really want to convert your documents with SignWriter Java, I could give you a copy of the software if you are running Macintosh OS X?  But it is filled with bugs right now, and you will have to work with me over the telephone to make it work for you...

Here is another message I wrote about this subject:

>First, if you look at all the faces in the GIFs for SignBank, you will see that the face circles have been improved! Those GIFs are taken from a new version of SignWriter, called SignWriter Java. It has been under development for around five years, and never got completed, so it is not available to the general public yet, but it does convert all the SignWriter DOS files into better-looking graphics....
>
>I have a working version of SignWriter Java on my Macintosh, but not on Windows yet. And even on the Mac, there are many bugs in the program, but technically your SignWriter DOS files"could be converted" on my Mac to better looking symbols - and it is done automatically - very quickly.
>
>Do you have a Macintosh? It has to be Mac OS X to use SignWriter Java...
>
>Meanwhile, you have the better-looking faces outside of SignWriter, in the GIFs and also inside SignBank itself....which is free for download at:
>
>Download SignBank and Archives
>http://www.SignBank.org/downloads/download01.html
>
>So there are three choices:
>
>1. Keep with the faces as they are...
>
>2. Replace the faces in the SignWriter DOS files by making the documents graphics files, and then replacing the faces one by one with the better GIFs from the SignBank Archives...
>
>3. Helping us fund the development of SignWriter Java for Windows...(smile - that doesn't solve your immediate problem).
>
>4. Finding a Macintosh on Malta that runs System X....do you have one of those? Then I can give you our "partially completed" SignWriter Java, and I can tell you what to do, if you want to convert the files to better graphics yourselves
>
>Then, you can print to PDF on the Mac from SignWriter Java. From the PDF, you can export to JPEGs, TIFFS or Photoshop PDF graphics files...then you can use those files for your publication - and you will have better looking circles!
>
>Val ;-)
>
>-----------------------------
>
>
>
> >Dear Val,
> >
> >The Maltese SW Dictionary project is gaining momentum after a multitude of technical issues and hardware glitches.
> >
> >We have now contacted a publisher in order to a produce a printed version of the material contained on the CD.  They have asked whether the signwriting produced using your Sign Writer DOS software can be modified to represent symbols with more boxes, for it to be clearer when printing.
> >
> >For example, although one immediately realises that heads/faces are represented using circles, the actual circle produced with SW is made up of squares.  Is there a way to make it look like a perfect circle?