Re: [css-ruby] ruby-position: inter-character

Hi Richard

I've asked with a font expert, But Ko. Reply below

> Bobby, Yijun, do you know whether OpenType features are widely implemented in Chinese fonts that would automatically handle bopomofo as vertical ruby if CSS provided the right trigger (bearing in mind that in some circumstances (rare) vertical alignment is not wanted, but rather horizontal ruby or, in occasional educational or modern informal text just plain bopomofo)?

In experimental implementation, handling bopomofo as vertical ruby automatically is possible:
http://but.tw/font/bpmfpy.html

However, it's based on GSUB, and containing many glyphs which is not defined in Adobe-CNS1-x.

I think it's possible to implement by GPOS without additional glyph.
However, there is no any implementation exists due to GPOS is not supported very well currently.

> I have seen fonts that include bopomofo ruby, but I believe that these are rather special fonts, and I'm not even sure whether you can hide the ruby when using them.

It's the tradition way, from movable types to digital fonts.
Since tone mark cannot be styled easily, 
and reading of Chinese word is relatively fixed.
Pre-merged glyphs are easy to use.
However, this way can not show rare readings, and without any standard.
(some character has more than one reading,
 however, all readings may be listed in different order in fonts of different font vendors.

Conclusion:
No any font support format bopomofo ruby automatically currently.
I think implement by CSS is more feasible solution.

But Ko (font@but.tw)


> Richard Ishida <ishida@w3.org> 於 2014年9月19日 下午1:26 寫道：
> 
> Hi Koji,
> 
> On 19/09/2014 04:46, Koji Ishii wrote:
>> Last time when we discussed on the exact positioning of tone marks, we were not very sure
> 
> Who is 'we'?
> 
> > whether this should be handled in layout or in font with support from GPOS and other OpenType features built into the fonts. I think most leaned towards to
> 
> Again, most of who?
> 
> >
> the font approach, but nobody actually looked into it and existing OpenType features provides all the necessary layout for the tone mark positioning.
> 
> I would think that this is a non-starter unless the necessary OpenType features are already present in most Chinese fonts. I don't know whether that's the case, or what proportion of fonts have it, but I'm rather dubious that you'd find that available, and extremely doubtfull that it's available in the majority of Chinese fonts, so I'm inclined to think that handling in layout is likely to provide greater interoperability.
> 
> I have seen fonts that include bopomofo ruby, but I believe that these are rather special fonts, and I'm not even sure whether you can hide the ruby when using them.
> 
> 
> 
> ri
> 
>> 
>> The benefits of using OpenType features is that then you'll get all the features free in TextEdit and other applications. The downside is probably a layer issue, we'd need some fonts expert.
>

Received on Friday, 19 September 2014 06:26:09 UTC