Re: Clustering rules (was Re: Adding tis620.2533-0...)

[Steve Underwood <steveu coppice org>]

Prabhat Hegde wrote:

> [...]
>         absolutely! and that is what i will be telling the CDAC folks who are
>         in touch with me.
>
>         BTW, i came to know of this 'standard' when i found many indian language
>         newspapers promimently displaying "ISFOC Font' on their web-pages.
>
>         if interested also look up www.scit.4mg.com/gist.html and look up ISFOC.

Is that a suprise? All the things we may be trying to solve now for various
languages on the desktop were solved long ago by the typesetting industry. Its a
pain that so little of their work is really accessible, and everyone has to
reinvent the wheel.

Western typesetting style has tended to creep into many languages in recent years.
That comes directly from the use of western developed typesetting systems, adapted
for other languages, with limited sympathy for their traditions. For example, every
Chinese school-kid is taught to write characters on a rigid grid using sqaured
paper. Some standard historiical examples are quoted to them of the terrible
results the ambiguity resulting from variable spacing may cause. Look in a modern
newspaper, and some of the Chinese text is variable pitch, for justification. What
should one follow on the desktop - traditional style, or modern newspaper style?

Regards,
Steve