RE: CJK support in ConTeXt

["Tim 't Hart" <tim@t-hart.com>]

Hong Feng wrote:

> The currently ConTeXt release support UTF-8, CJKV locales can all be
> represented in UTF-8, so the mechanism is already done.
> 
> IMHO, the real one work to do is to make the sets of typesetting
> conventions (typesetting rules) for each locale of CJKV (like
> the Chinese package did), that would varies quite much from
> locale to locale, all all of them are based on the same
> underlayed mechanism.

My very first experiment with trying to use Japanese with ConTeXt made use
of ConTeXt's built-in support for UTF-8. I soon found out that there is no
line breaking present when UTF-8 support is used. So that has to be
implemented. I'm not sure, but I remember that Hans once told me that that
the typesetting mechanism and line breaking algorithm as used in the Chinese
module cannot be directly used for UTF-8 support. Therefore I'm not sure if
we can simply say that the 'mechanism is already done'. Maybe Hans can tell
how difficult it is to add a line breaking mechanism to the UTF-8 support?

It would be really handy if we could use ConTeXt's UTF-8 support so that
some work for a CJK module is already done. But on the other hand, by using
e-Omega, a lot of work is also already done. We have to make sure that
adapting the UTF-8 mechanism doesn't take more time and effort than creating
a module based on e-Omega. A CJK module based on e-Omega is maybe easier to
write and more flexible. For example, not everyone can write documents in
UTF-8. e-Omega will allow almost any kind of file encoding as long as there
is an OTP available to convert it to Unicode. 

So I think the questions we have to ask ourselves are: Do we make line
breaking and typesetting algorithms for ConTeXt's UTF-8 support or for
e-Omega? What is the time and effort needed in creating a CJK module for
each solution? And what solution gives the most powerful typesetting
options?

Personally, I would go for the e-Omega option, but I wouldn't mind seeing a
module based on ConTeXt's UTF-8 support. As long as there is support for
CJK, I'll be happy! :)

My best,
Tim