<rp> fallback in complex ruby.

I'm considering about the fallback using <rp> in complex ruby.

*Markup
<ruby>
  <rbc><rb>漢</rb><rb>字</rb></rbc>
  <rp>(</rp>
    <rtc><rt>かん</rt><rt>じ</rt></rtc>
  <rp>）</rp>
</ruby>

In this case, the UA that doesn't support complex ruby would render like below.

*Rendering
  漢字(かんじ)

If <ruby> has two <rtc>,

*Markup
<ruby>
  <rbc><rb>漢</rb><rb>字</rb></rbc>
  <rp>(</rp><rtc><rt>かん</rt><rt>じ</rt></rtc><rp>)</rp>
  <rp>(</rp><rtc><rt rbspan='2'>Kanji</rt></rtc><rp>)</rp>
</ruby>

*Rendering
 漢字(かんじ)(Kanji)

In HTML5, <rp> is used like below markup.

*Markup
<ruby>
  漢<rp>(</rp><rt>かん</rt><rp>)</rp>
  字<rp>(</rp><rt>じ</rt><rp>)</rp>
</ruby>

*Rendering
  漢(かん)字(じ)

Acutually this rendering isn't easy to read, becuase the pronunciation
is divided. (of course it is easy to read if an UA supports ruby!)
'漢字' is considered as a compound word (jukugo), so I think the
prounountiation should not be divided. (So rtc and rbc markup and
styling is very strong.)


The specificaiton of XHTML Ruby say that <rp> element is not avaliable
in the case of complex ruby markup.
There are two reasons [1].

"First, the rp element is only a fallback mechanism, and it was
considered that this is much more important for the more frequent
simple case."
"Second, for the more complex cases, it is difficult to come up with a
reasonable fallback display, and constructing markup for such cases
can be even more difficult if not impossible."

Considering digital publising technology based XML and CSS like epub,
I think it is important to consider the divistiy of UAs (from very
high book viewer to very simple web browser on mobile phones.)
I think that the markup that I gave would be a pretty reasonable.

Do you have any ideas or comments for this suggestions?


[1]: http://www.w3.org/TR/ruby/#complex


Regards,
Hajime.



-- 
# 青山学院大学大学院
# 理工学研究科  知能情報コース
# 塩澤 元 (Shiozawa, Hajime)
# mail: hajime.shiozawa@gmail.com

Received on Tuesday, 7 December 2010 05:54:52 UTC