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From: cik@l.cc.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
Newsgroups: sci.lang,comp.std.internat
Subject: Re: generalised alphabets
Message-ID: <573@l.cc.purdue.edu>
Date: Sat, 29-Aug-87 09:22:07 EDT
Article-I.D.: l.573
Posted: Sat Aug 29 09:22:07 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 30-Aug-87 09:18:27 EDT
References: <15488@mordor.s1.gov>
Organization: Purdue University Statistics Department
Lines: 28
Summary: We do not need standards; we need flexibility
Xref: mnetor sci.lang:1265 comp.std.internat:186

In article <15488@mordor.s1.gov>, pom@under..ARPA (Peter O. Mikes) writes:
> Subject: generalised alphabets (letters + diacritics)
> 	One conclusion which follows from the last month of discussions 
> on accented languages is, that we should be happy that we have ASCII and ISCII
> and that at least one of them has a lasting place in both past and future.
Why?
> 	The other, being in accordance with MEGATRENDS, is that we do have 
>  and will have also a need for more general method (since French are not going
>  to give up any cheese) of describing accented letters.

What we need is a very flexible method which does not _require_ (as in the
roffs and TeX) that the user hit many keys for a result, and also allows 
whatever the user wants displayed when the user types it.  I do not care if
_you_ define a typed character to be e with a grave accent, or if _you_ require
that for _your_ terminal you must type the accent first and then the e;  but
whatever method that _I_ use should produce the character on my screen, and I
should be able to customize it to my requirements.  At the present time, this
is very difficult.

	For any particular language, it may be advisable to have a standard,
which should be published, so that different people may produce the appropriate
front- and back-ends for communications purposes.  However, this should not be
a standard for terminals.  That ASCII is used for communication is no good 
reason why a terminal should use it.
-- 
Herman Rubin, Dept. of Statistics, Purdue Univ., West Lafayette IN47907
Phone: (317)494-6054
hrubin@l.cc.purdue.edu (ARPA or UUCP) or hrubin@purccvm.bitnet