Re: Text Editor

Martin Duerst wrote:
> At 23:19 08/11/09, Andre Schappo wrote:
>   
>> I am new to this list so apologies if I initially go over old ground.
>>
>> I have just been reading <http://www.w3.org/International/questions/qa-bidi-controls > and have experimented with both unicode and html methods of  
>> controlling directionality.
>>
>> What I would really like is a Text Editor that I can toggle between  
>> "bidi display mode" and "logical display mode"
>>
>> By "logical display mode" I mean that the editor shows the raw  
>> underlying characters ie the order they were typed in
>>
>> By "bidi display mode" I mean displaying the final form after  
>> application of the direction directives/"character properties".
>>
>> Anyone know of such a Text Editor ?? I am using Leopard on an Apple Mac.
>>
>> I have already tried several editors and also gone down to the Unix  
>> level (pico & vi) but none provide both display modes.
>>     
>
> Your "logical display mode" would mean that e.g. Arabic and Hebrew
> are written left-to-right, which would simply be unreadable. 
It depends on what you want to do (and for whom?). Sometime it is  
easier to fix small portions of bidi-text (e.g. add/delete punctuations) 
by looking directly at the logical order. There are other use cases. 
That's why I share Andre Schappo's concern. I remember I once asked if a 
composer like Mozilla/NVU could offer another mode (in addition to HTML 
/ Wysiwyg modes)  to "toggle between 'bidi display mode' and 'logical 
display mode'", at least in HTML-source mode.
The implication of such "logical display mode" is, for Arabic, that the 
letters shouldn't join (which could contribute to the unreadability you 
mention).
> So that
> would be my explanation for why such an editor doesn't exist.
> It may be possible to find an editor that essentially does
> "logical display" by simply using an editor that doesn't do
> any bidi processing. But even editors that don't do any bidi
> processing these days may end up with some kind of poor bidi
> display, because of the way they use an underlying (OS or
> window system) rendering engine.
>   

Yes, that is also an obstacle.

Regards, Najib
> For a somewhat different approach on how to edit bidi html
> and xml, please have a look at
> http://www.sw.it.aoyama.ac.jp/2005/pub/IUC28-bidi/ and
> http://www.sw.it.aoyama.ac.jp/2008/pub/IUC32-bidi/.
> Comments and questions welcome.
>
> Regards,   Martin.
>
>
>
> #-#-#  Martin J. Du"rst, Assoc. Professor, Aoyama Gakuin University
> #-#-#  http://www.sw.it.aoyama.ac.jp       mailto:duerst@it.aoyama.ac.jp     
>
>
>
>

Received on Tuesday, 11 November 2008 17:28:02 UTC