Binary SignWriting history and conversion

[Steve Slevinski]

Hi Alan,

Binary SignWriting was an attempt to use character data to encode sign 
texts.  While the plain text of symbols (1-dimensional strings) remains 
the foundation of BSW, the additional characters of structure and number 
have been eliminated from BSW.

Over the past year, I've made several key distinctions and improvements 
to the data standards for sorting, layout, and Unicode integration.  BSW 
now only deals with symbol identity.  BSW no longer includes characters 
for layout or annotation.  The BSW foundation is expressly defined and 
can be used with any real or theoretical higher level text encoding for 
SignWriting that uses the ISWA 2010.
http://www.signpuddle.net/plaintext

I have restored the BSW 3A links for SignPuddle 1.5; however, these 
links will not exist in SignPuddle 1.6. Testing will begin shortly.

Because there are several historical data formats being used, I will 
create a conversion package for the historical BSW data formats.  You 
will be able to use it online or downloaded (requires php environment).

The new Cartesian SignWriting data format is able to fully encode 
SignWriting.  It uses the latest Unicode proposal and includes an ASCII 
equivalent data format.  CSW will be a stable standard for many years to 
come.

I have converted the SignPuddle 1.5 data set to the new CSW format for 
SignPuddle 1.6.  You can download an entire puddle as a single XML file.

The ASL - English dictionary is a 3MB.
http://www.signbank.org/signpuddle1.6/data/spml/sgn4.spml

You can open the SPML file in any standard text editor or specialized 
XML editor.  By using search, copy and paste: you can access the sign 
language data directly.

After SignPuddle 1.6 goes live, I will finalize work on the updated 
SignWriting Image Server.  I can prepare a development snapshot of SWIS 
if you are interested.

Regards,
-Steve