[Freebangfont-devel] Fw: [Indic] Bengali Proposal

----- Original Message -----

To: Sandipan Sarkar ; address@hidden

Cc: address@hidden ; address@hidden ; address@hidden ; address@hidden ; address@hidden ; address@hidden ; Raveesh Gupta

Sent: Saturday, August 30, 2003 5:19 AM

Subject: RE: [Indic] Bengali Proposal

Dear Sandipan,

I spoke with the Unicode Technical Committee yesterday. We came to an agreement that I should seek to build concensus on how to standardize Bengali before the next UTC meeting in late September.

Being able to arrive at a concensus is critical as there is no way to standardize implementation without people agreeing how this should be implemented.

I am trying to finish up the Windows update of Bengali script support. I am aware that there is also an effort in the Linux community to have Bengali support. Because the only contention remaining is limited to a few issues, I hope that we can have some dialog to finally arrive at a unified approach to the Reph and Yaphala issue.

Making the rendering of the conjuncts or ligatures the choice of the font designer is an excellent way to address this. In OpenType there is a "language" tag for Malayalam Repormed *and* Malayalam Traditional. I would propose that we do something similar for Bengali, whereby a "Bengali Schoolbook - BES" orthography can be selected that is different than "Bengali - BEN" which would be the traditional manner in which to form ligatures in literature. This would remove one topic from the discussion.

In the same manner that the previous paragraph suggests it is the font designer's choice to support various writing styles, it should also therefore be the choice of the font designer to either ligate or not ligate the yaphala without the use of ZWJ. As above, the OT language differentiation could also allow different behaviors in the same font. This would remove another issue from the discussion

That then leaves only the Reph and Yaphala item and Khanda Ta item as issues that need to be resolved.

REPH and YAPHALA

Since the YA with REPH above is more commonly used, the RA HALANT YA should produce that result. I have proposed that the RA YAPHALA be formed by using RA ZWNJ HALANT YA.

By Unicode rules, Cons-Halant forms the half form. The REPH is the half form of the RA at the beginning of a cluster.

By Unicode rules, Cons-Halant-ZWJ forces the formation of the half form. This would indicate that the REPH should be formed at the beginning of a cluster as well.

By Unicode rules, Cons-Halant-ZWNJ forces the halant form. This would have the RA HALANT displayed.

The logic of using the RA ZWNJ HALANT was to keep the RA HALANT apart so that the YAPHALA COULD be formed as the postbase of the syllable.

Is it possible to gain a concensus on the Unicode character stream behavior for the REPH and YAPHALA based on the logic presented above?

Regards,

Paul Nelson

From: Sandipan Sarkar [mailto:address@hidden
Sent: Thursday, August 28, 2003 10:27 AM
To: Paul Nelson (TYPOGRAPHY); Paul Nelson (TYPOGRAPHY)
Cc: address@hidden; address@hidden; address@hidden; address@hidden; address@hidden; address@hidden; Raveesh Gupta
Subject: [Indic] Bengali Proposal

Hello Paul,

We came across your proposal on Bengali Unicode. First, we appreciate your efforts to standadize the implementation of Bengali script on Unicode. Working on this for the past two years, we have a first hand experience how lack of standardization is weakening the collective efforts.

Based on our experience of working with the Bengali Unicode script, I have responded to your proposal and your concern on the changes suggested by Bangla Schoolbook Reform of Bangladesh in the attached PDF document. Please let me know whether this helps you. We would be eager to participate in your process of formulating the standard. Lets keep the communication channel open.

Thanks and regards.

--sandIpan

Sandipan Sarkar

Celcius Technolgies

----- Original Message -----

From: "Manoj Jain" <address@hidden>

To: <address@hidden>; "TAMAL SEN" <address@hidden>

Cc: "P.K Chaturvedi" <address@hidden>; "Om Vikas" <address@hidden>

Sent: Thursday, July 03, 2003 12:19 PM

Subject: [Indic] Bengali Proposal

> Dear Sir,
>
> Please see the forwarded mail from MR. Paul Nelson, regarding the Unicode
> for Bengali Script. Kindly send your comments to Unicode discussion forum
> with a copy to Department of IT, New Delhi.
>
> With regards,
>
>
> Manoj Jain
> Scientist "C"
> Government of India
> Ministry of Communications & IT
> Department of Information Technology
> New Delhi 110003
> Phone +91-11-24301240 Fax +91-11-24363076
>
>
> ----- Forwarded by Manoj Jain/doe on 07/01/03 01:32 PM -----
>
>                       "Paul Nelson
>                       \(TYPOGRAPHY\)"           To:       <address@hidden>, "Omi Azad"
>                       <address@hidden         <address@hidden>, "Solaiman Karim"
>                       rosoft.com>                <address@hidden>, "Peri Bhaskararao"
>                       Sent by:                   <address@hidden>, "Sanjiv Burman"
>                       address@hidden         <address@hidden>, "santosh rastapur"
>                       de.org                     <address@hidden>, "Shamsuddoha/T&ITBangladesh"
>                                                  <address@hidden>, "Mike Meir"
>                                                  <address@hidden>, "Naushad Jamil"
>                       07/01/03 10:41 AM          <address@hidden>, "Andy"
>                                                  <address@hidden>, <address@hidden>
>                                                 cc:       "Cathy Wissink" <address@hidden>,
>                                                  "Raveesh Gupta" <address@hidden>
>                                                 Subject: [indic] Bengali Proposal
>
>
>
>
>
> The attached is an update to the document I wrote, L2/03-209 posted in the
> Unicode document register. I am including this to a wider distribution than
> the Unicode list in hopes of being able to get some type of
> resolution/concensus on how Unicode should work with the Bengali script.
>
> Following are some observations and presuppositions that go into my
> document.
>
> 1. This document is not about input sequences or methods. It is about
> defining the rendering behavior of Unicode character streams when they are
> used in documents.
>
> 2. It is understood that typographic preferences exist between various
> parties. This document is to make sure that those preferences are
> addressable in plain Unicode text (i.e. text without any higher level
> markup).
>
> 3. It is understood that some examples shown do no exist in real life.
> However, as an implementer of an engine for Bengali script I need to
> understand how to respond and advise font makers to code their fonts if an
> "non-existent" use of codepoints is encountered.
>
> It is my sincere desire that this document will allow a unified use of
> Unicode encoded text that will stimulate the global transfer of Bengali
> script text on any platform.
>
> All behavior not mentioned in the document should be assumed to follow
> documents previously published by the Unicode Consortium. I have taken
> special care to follow the Unicde rules and definitions.
>
> Please forwrd the attached document to others who should also be included
> in this discussion.
>
> Regards,
>
> Paul Nelson
> Development Lead
> Microsoft Font Technology(See attached file:
> BengaliProposal_2003_06_30.pdf)
>

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From:	Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay
Subject:	[Freebangfont-devel] Fw: [Indic] Bengali Proposal
Date:	Sat, 30 Aug 2003 05:19:47 +0530