Re: SVG fonts: [ was RE: minutes, SVG WG TPAC F2F 2014, day 2]

Robert,

If all these characters are incorporated in Unicode character, how is it  
possible that SVG fonts do not support them? Isn't it just a question of  
having a very extensive set of Glyph? And wouldn't that be something that  
is addressed by the authoring software rather than a font set? I doubt  
that anyone using Devangari on an iPhone has that much of a problem with  
it.

I gather they actually have some kind of PinYin imnput method for it, am I  
right? And though archaic writing systems are quite fashionable to prevent  
the neighbours form understanding what it is all about, there is a clear  
case of replacement of these systems by alphabetic writing if I take  
Chinese as an example.

Asked to write a character by hand has become a kind of trivia show here  
in China, where people use PinYin input systems and then recognise the  
correct form or the character. But SVG fonts support an unlimited amount  
of Glyphs and you can unicode these glyphs in 16 bits or more. So were is  
the real issue here?

Or does the first Character influence the last one depending on what it  
says? Even there it would be mainly the issue of authoring and editing  
text than the display of it. Clearly,.. we don't quite get the issue at  
hand here, by lack of experience and imagination. Could you explain it in  
brief by example.

Jelle

On Sat, 16 Nov 2013 04:11:59 +0800, Robert Longson <longsonr@gmail.com>  
wrote:

>> It's a shame that we are giving up on SVG fonts, it's a great feature.
>
> You're biased because you read and write a language thar SVG fonts can  
> support.
>
>> I don't use them because two major platforms have decreed that they  
>> won't
>> implement them for various reasons that I have never understood.
>
> Try writing something in Devangari using SVG fonts and you might
> change your mind.
> The web is for everyone, not just those people that read/write Western
> European languages.
> The firefox developers have made this point on several occasions.
>
>> SVG fonts rock, they have so many uses beyond the description of text,  
>> and
>> implemented properly they would do that in ways that regular fonts  
>> cannot.
>
> SVG glyphs in OpentType should solve such issues and have proper
> language support.
>
> Best regards
>
> Robert.

Received on Friday, 15 November 2013 21:02:27 UTC