Re: coding-system difficulties

[Fredrik Staxeng <fstx+u@update.uu.se>]

Cyprian Laskowski <swagbelly@yahoo.com> writes:

>Reiner Steib <4uce.02.r.steib@gmx.net> writes:
>
>> If Cyprian uses Emacs with X, the solution is to install proper
>> Latin-9 fonts. Or you may want to use ucs-tables, see
>> <URL:http://my.gnus.org/Members/rsteib/howto_unify/>.
>
>But since Emacs clearly is able to render this stuff, why would I need
>extra fonts?  

Because it's the right thing. :-) 

>Maybe this is precisely the kind of thing that I don't understand ...
>Can someone suggest a good reference (thorough, but not too
>intimidating) for someone who has had the mixed blessing of usually
>dealing exclusively with ascii/English, but who now wants to become
>comfortable with dealing with these kinds of issues, instead of
>running into a corner every time or pestering Emacs gurus?

I have found some useful information on czyborra.com. For the most
part he seems to describe existing practice in a fairly objective
way. 

When you you want to compare specific characters sets, you can use 
the files on http://www.unicode.org/Public/MAPPINGS. If download 
the files and run diff on them you will see which characters that
differ.

Some countries seem to have one dominant way of coding their language
in computers. Some countries have a few mostly compatible encodings.
Some countries have incompatible encodings, so software tend to
acquire auto-detection capabilities.

Language is highly politicized issue in some countries.  Some people
want to push Unicode/UTF-8 as the solution.  Microsoft have used
embrace and extend even in this arena, and are of course met with some
resistance from the other systems. Some people resent that English
has (almost) fulfilled the esperanto dream of becoming the world's
standard second language. This issue also holds some mystical
attraction for people who like to take small problems and do big
overcomplex solutions. (I'm thinking of certain Dane, not anybody
present here).

So there is plenty to fight about. The politics are complex, but when
looking closer I have always found the technical issues to quite simple.
This is not surprising after all. When you take a computer system
and make it able to represent your language, you take the easiest 
way. You also preserve compatibility with English, so using
English on a Thai computer is not a problem. Using Greek on Thai
computer probably is. 

(Except for bidirectional scripts. I don't see any reasonable way to
handle that. But some UTF-8 supporters seem to have come to the
conclusion that the only feasible technical solution is to change the
script, so I am not alone)

-- 
Fredrik Stax\"ang | rot13: sfgk@hcqngr.hh.fr