On Mon, 14 Oct 2002 17:01:20 +0530 LinuxLingam <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> hi GK, > thanks for your response, and for forwarding my mailing to fred in > goa. quick responses to your comments: > > > I appreciate the vision & objective, but I am afraid if the goal > > of > > contest is to have good quality opentype fonts, then contest would > > come short of it as font design needs an artistic hand , knowledge > > of script/language . A more appropriate objective of contest could > > be have contestants design a basic font ( lets say just the > > Unicode ranges ). > > agreed that font design and typography is a multi-disciplinary > approach with strong sense of aesthetics and coding. *but* its a > pity nothing is even mentioned about this important aspect of > computing in education, ever! thus the contest. > the reason i wish to have the fonts and source files gpl-ed, is > 'cause the constant refinement principle can kick-in. > i expect the start to be beautifully imperfect. should i wish or > hanker for perfection at the contest, no indian font design will > ever take place, and all the interested and curious would run away. > should it start, and people get to appreciate its grandeur and > impact, i assume more and more people will get involved, and build > it up from scratch into a tidal wave. > > > > > Recently one company Cyberscape multimedia ( Akruti ) made > > available > > set of fonts under GNU GPL. > > See http://www.akruti.com/freedom/ . [snip] > > yup! am aware of this. when i started planning the contest, this > news hadn't happened. i feel indian language coding needs a gigantic > amount of work, in infinite dimensions, and we haven't even > scratched the surface, all under gpl so that all end users have the > freedoms that it deserves for use: > > i) good quality unicode+otf fonts. 2) variety of fonts for different > > purposes. 3) indian language input engines, unicode-savvy, for mac, > win, linux, unix, psion, symbian, etc. 4) unicode-based indian > language dictionaries 5) indian language OCR with 95% or higher > accuracy. 6) indian language text to speech, with the correct > phonetics of the bigger range of sounds and syllables. 7) indian > language speech to text. 8) indian language handwriting recognition > 9) indian language translation tools within indian languages, as > well as with other languages. > > 10) i also dream of a new kind of input device, beyond the mouse, > the keyboard, stylus pen, or microphone, that would be far more > appropriate for indian languages. something perhaps that would have > ripple effects and be used for all languages. think about it, the > keyboard is the world's most infamous device designed to speed input > down, rather than up. (read its historical legacy at ibm). and its > so made-for-western alphabets and languages. > > 11) indian language grammar, style, checker. this would be awesome. > it could perhaps make our languages much more convenient and easier > to use, and a customised style engine could perhaps refine its use, > much like what premchand and rabindranath tagore and other leading > lights did to hindi and bengali. if tagore could win a nobel prize, > it shows that the languages are rich and refined, we haven't found > anyone to wield it with the same power and grace, yet. <<all this > IMHO>>. > > > the contest, at the juncture of the inter-school competition, is > merely to ignite the minds of indians towards the dire need for > digital development of our own needs in india. i feel really sorry, > disappointed, and disillusioned, when i note the perhaps > sub-conscious approach of the govt. and the media, that our indian > language coding solutions will be made available thru commercial > licensing to us, by powerful, monopolistic MNC companies, or from > pockets of individuals, entrepreneurs, or govt. agencies, often > working in collision with one another. > > how about a tide that moves in the affairs of indians? > At least in open source space, efforts have started coming together with Indic-computing group. Recently a workshop was held in bangalore, where current status on indian languages in computing was discussed and all groups bringing their work together. Your ideas would definetly be appreciated there. See http://indic-computing.sourceforge.net Join the lists http://lists.sourceforge.net/mailman/listinfo/indic-computing-users http://lists.sourceforge.net/mailman/listinfo/indic-computing-standards http://lists.sourceforge.net/mailman/listinfo/indic-computing-devel Regards, Karunakar > linuxlingam > >
