[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: [Announce] Wordtrans 1.1pre8 released



I am sorry (not so very much, just a bit :-) to notice a number of 
inexactitudes in the attached excerpts.

1) It is not true that (speaking of the support for Ctrl+RightShift):
> I don't think this is necessary it's removed from recent versions of
> windows too where only language toggle is done.
I have not yet checked Windows XP, but at least until Windows 2000, it is 
supported.  What you must understand is that this is not a feature of 
Windows in general, but of Windows applications.  Applications may choose 
to support it or not.  Standard Windows applications which support it are 
the Edit Field widget (which is widely used in dialogs and is the base for 
Notepad) and Wordpad.

2) Right alignment has nothing to do with the Unicode Bidi algorithm. 
Again, this is a feature that an application may implement or not.  No 
amount of RLMs will make an application align text to the right unless  a) 
it supports right alignment in general  b) there is special code to 
activate right alignment in certain cases (e.g. when text contains 
right-to-left characters).

3) The Unicode Bidi algorithm states that by default the base direction 
(== paragraph level) is induced from the first "strong" character in the 
text.  It does not imply that QT will conform to this, because  a) QT may 
not implement completely and exactly the Unicode Bidi algorithm  b) QT 
designers may have decided not to rely on a default, but to allow explicit 
specification of the base direction, which would constitute a "higher 
protocol".

4) It is possible to "force" the RTL orientation of a segment of text by 
putting RLE (U+202B) before it and PDF (U+202C) after it.  This is 
definitely part of the Unicode algorithm, but not all implementations 
honor it.  Windows NT and 2k do, XP probably also. 
As far as I know, FriBidi, for instance, does not support RLE/PDF.

Shalom (Regards),  Mati
           Bidi Architect
           Globalization Center Of Competency - Bidirectional Scripts
           IBM Israel
           Phone: +972 2 5870999  ext. 1202    Fax: +972 2 5870333 Mobile: 
+972 52 554160


Sent by:        linux-il-bounce@cs.huji.ac.il
To:        "Yair Friedman (Jerusalem)" <YAIRFR@Amdocs.com>
cc:        linux-il@linux.org.il 
Subject:        Re: [Announce] Wordtrans 1.1pre8 released



On Sun, Dec 30, 2001 at 05:42:34PM +0200, Yair Friedman (Jerusalem) wrote:
> Yedidyah Bar-David <didi@post.tau.ac.il> writes:
>
> > Is there any way for the data to make that happen, instead of the
> > application? I looked at the Unicode bidi algorithm and I don't think
> > I found anything (any unicode char, for that matter) that can make 
that
> > happen. If there isn't, that's very sad; it means that we can't dream 
of
> > general applications to have good hebrew support without manual fixes.
>
> Sorry Yedidyah, but I'm not sure what exactly your problem.  If you mean
> the alignment which is "paragraph main direction", according to Unicode
> bidi algorithm this is the 1st strong character (This is on of the
> possible uses of LRM/RLM).

Well, I tried putting RLM in the beginning, and it didn't work. Perhaps
a bug in QT (3, havn't tried 2.x)?
Note, in "UAX #9: The Bidirectional Algorithm", under section
"The Paragraph Level", it says, after step P3:
"Note that when a higher-level protocol specifies the paragraph level,
it is not necessary to apply rules P2 and P3.".
Seems like a possible point of confusion to me. Maybe QT decided to
ignore this part, being a "higher-level protocol" (e.g. put it into
the widget - and that's how Ricardo solved the problem).

>
> >
> > Does QT have (or, how difficult it is to implement) something like
> > Right-Ctrl-Shift in windows, which makes the selected text right
> > alligned (I think without the help of the application)?
>
> I don't think this is necessary it's removed from recent versions of
> windows too where only language toggle is done.
> >
> > Note, BTW, that I made libbab output UTF-8 (and not ISO8859-8).
> > Ricardo made the console version able to output many charsets.
> >
> > This reply is mainly to the list, to the bidi experts in it :-),
>
> Defiantly not Me :-)

I also CC the list. Where are the experts :-) ?

        Didi


=================================================================
To unsubscribe, send mail to linux-il-request@linux.org.il with
the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command
echo unsubscribe | mail linux-il-request@linux.org.il