Re: Unicode encoding policy
One important factor is also stability: some symbols may get a temporary interest and then raidly abandoned for a new flavor, hardly related to the previously encoded one. Stability is also a need when UTC resources and work time is limited to focus in things that have been already waited for long (even if there were some difficult discussions, notably when trying to deal with variants and different usage patterns, or in more complex situations discovered with difficulties like text layout; or creation of distinctive of contextual ligatures, or when discussing about some critical character properties such as word boundaries, or expected specific alignments with other characters including with some other scripts). For that the UTC has a useful tool: the roadmap which attempts to organize the standardization work by topics and communities of interest, in order to avoid duplicate discussions or create coherent proposals that will also resist other future additions. Emojis however exist inly in relation to themselves, and their coherence really comes from their adoption on a range of devices or OSes and common applications. Large vendors (like Google for Android, Apple for iOS, and Microsoft for Windows, but also some wellknown websites connected to many others like Yahoo, Twitter or Facebook and their supported applications running on various OSes and devices, or Baidu in China, or Mail.ru in Russia, are also desiring to open their own sets to offer support to users communicating from devices/OSes made by other vendors inclujding in other countries. There could be also other killer apps amde available on various OSes and devices which could benefir from this standardization, such as keyboard extensions for smartphones/tablets, or sets of generic icons commnly needed for user interfaces (e.g. the icons that appear in Gmail for rich text editing or for managing emails and folders; people want to be able to use similar looking icons even if their exact design change specifically, simply because websites and support services will frequently reference them and people will want to discuss about their use in varous contexts; the same is true about typical icons found on popular navigation maps). People will understand those icons/symbols and will use them because they understand clearly what they mean in similar kind of usages. Those symbols are good candidate for standardization indepedendantly of their site-specific or device specific look (which can also evolve across versions, such as the symbols for buttons at the bottom of Android displays: having a standardized character for these evolving icons can also help application authors to describe their own UI and how to use them on a larger range of devices and versions: users will see the appropriate icon for their own local device in its current brand and version, but support pages do not need to be rewritten/modified to show different screenshots; these visible icons will also work if users have installed a different UI theme or if these icons are relocated elsewhere than what is displayed in basic screenshots made on a few devices in some old versions of their specific UI); the need for this icons is the same across all these devices and versions for similar functions. So we have icons/symbols with similar spirit across a large range of devices for basic functions: telephone handset to place a call or to reply, or to close a communication. In fact this is the same kind of things that have been used since long for icons for controlling all audio devices : play, stop, rewind, forward, pause, power up, power off, enter sleep mode, wake up, mute, volume up/down, icons for activating/deactivating Wifi or Bluetooth, icons for the headset or the radio, ejecting a media; start recording... Look also on a wide range of remote TV controlers. Note all of them are using distinctive glyphs, some are just differentiated by colors such as the red/yellow/green/blue buttons used in Teletext remote controlers (in my opinion color is not a requirement, and this could also be buttons with readable labels in a box, if need for accessibility is a demand: this has been recently standardized for tinting facial emojis by humane skin color, with an interesting proposed alternate representation where color can also be represented by a non ligatured monchromatic glyph). In all these cases, the demand for it and their use in various contexts where they can be tuned locally to match user expectations, is an excellent reason for standardizing them without breaking their intended meaning in those specific tuning contexts. Other interesting sets are those standardized on road signs, or warnin signs on various products (they are frequently international because their meaning is legally imperative for road users) or because their informative meaning is about services found almost everywhere in the world (e.g. luggage disposal, taxis, toilets, shower, hospital, parking, lunch places,
Re: Unicode encoding policy
Erkki I. Kolehmainen wrote as follows: The question of support for localizable sentences has been raised by you on several occasions. For a number of valid reasons, It has never received any noticeable support, let alone the kind of support that you are asking for now. Well, it is true that there has been little interest, though one man kindly translated the early sentences into Swedish, which has been of great help, and he also suggested an additional sentence, which is now part of the system. The lack of interest has always puzzled me, I had thought that with so many people on this mailing list who are interested in languages and communication, including many people who have a native language other than English, that there would be great interest in trying to produce a useful system. Now that there is the precedent of the encoding of the unicorn, perhaps things will be different as there is now the prospect of being able to develop and standardize a non-proprietary system that can be put into place for people to use without needing to first achieve either a widespread non-standardized implementation or a change in the rules just for this system.. Regarding your claim about valid reasons. Could you possibly say what you consider to be the valid reasons please? William Overington 29 December 2014 ___ Unicode mailing list Unicode@unicode.org http://unicode.org/mailman/listinfo/unicode
Re: Unicode encoding policy
Asmus Freytag wrote: The critical mass of support is now assumed for currency symbols, some special symbols like emoji, and should be granted to additional types of symbols, punctuations and letters, whenever there is an authority that controls normative orthography or notation. Whether this is for an orthography reform in some country or addition to the standard math symbols supported by AMS journals, such external adoption can signify immediate critical need and critical mass of option for the relevant characters. To me, it is remarkable that the critical mass of support argument that is applied, entirely appropriately, to new currency symbols (however misguided the motives for such might be) and math symbols and characters for people's names, is now also applied to BURRITO and UNICORN FACE. But then, I remember when folks used to cite the WG2 Principles and Procedures document for examples of what was and was not a good candidate for encoding. That seems so long ago now. -- Doug Ewell | Thornton, CO, USA | http://ewellic.org ___ Unicode mailing list Unicode@unicode.org http://unicode.org/mailman/listinfo/unicode
Re: Unicode encoding policy
William_J_G Overington wjgo underscore 10009 at btinternet dot com wrote: The lack of interest has always puzzled me, I had thought that with so many people on this mailing list who are interested in languages and communication, including many people who have a native language other than English, that there would be great interest in trying to produce a useful system. I had a similar discussion some time ago with a member of this list regarding encoding of flags. It's an interesting idea which I think deserves some thought, but it's not character encoding; and therefore it doesn't belong in Unicode, or so I would have supposed. I make no claim here about whether localizable sentences are interesting or deserving of thought. I only explain why I, interested in language and communication, don't believe Unicode is the proper venue for them. Regarding your claim about valid reasons. Could you possibly say what you consider to be the valid reasons please? I'm not Erkki, but what I would have said, with my old-fashioned view of character encoding, is: because it's not character encoding. -- Doug Ewell | Thornton, CO, USA | http://ewellic.org ___ Unicode mailing list Unicode@unicode.org http://unicode.org/mailman/listinfo/unicode
Re: Unicode encoding policy
On 12/29/2014 10:32 AM, Doug Ewell wrote: Asmus Freytag wrote: The critical mass of support is now assumed for currency symbols, some special symbols like emoji, and should be granted to additional types of symbols, punctuations and letters, whenever there is an authority that controls normative orthography or notation. Whether this is for an orthography reform in some country or addition to the standard math symbols supported by AMS journals, such external adoption can signify immediate critical need and critical mass of option for the relevant characters. To me, it is remarkable that the critical mass of support argument that is applied, entirely appropriately, to new currency symbols (however misguided the motives for such might be) and math symbols and characters for people's names, is now also applied to BURRITO and UNICORN FACE. Does it - in principle - matter what a symbol is used for? If millions of happy users choose to communicate by peppering their messages with BURRITO and UNICORN FACE is that any less worthy of standardization than if thousands (or hundreds) of linguists use some arcane letterform to mark pronunciation differences between neighboring dialects on the Scandinavian peninsula? The critical mass argument does not (and should not) make value judgements, but instead focus on whether the infrastructure exists to make a character code widely available pretty much directly after publication, and whether there is implicit or explicit demand that would guarantee that such code is actually widely used the minute it comes available. For currency symbols, or for a new letter form demanded by a new or revised, but standard, orthography, the demand is created by some authority creating a requirement for conforming users. Because of that, the evaluation of the critical mass requirement is straightforward. Emoji lack an authority, but they do not lack demand. For better or for worse, they have grabbed significant mind share; the number of news reports, blogs, social media posts, shared videos and what not that were devoted to Emoji simply dwarfs anything reported on currency symbols in a comparative time frame. With tracking applications devoted to them, anyone can convince themselves, in real time, that the entire repertoire is being used, even, as appropriate for such a collection, with a clear differentiation by frequency. Nevertheless, the indication is clear that any emoji that will be added by the relevant vendors is going to be used as soon as it comes available. Further, as no vendor has a closed ecosystem, to be usable requires agreement on how they are coded. The critical question, and I fully understand that this gives you pause, is one of selection. There are hundreds, if not thousands of potential additions to the emoji collection, some fear the set is, in principle, endless. Lacking an authority how does one come to a principled agreement on encoding any emoji now, rather than later. One would run an experiment, which is to say, create an alternate environment where users can use non-standard emoji and then the Uni-scientists in white lab coats could count the frequency of usage and promote the cream off the top to standardized codes. Or one could run an experiment where one defines a small number of slots, say 40, and opens them up for public discussion, and proceeds on that basis. Yes, that would turn the UTC into the authority. My personal take is that the former approach is inappropriate for something that is in high demand and actively supported; the latter I can accept, provisionally, as an experiment to try to deal with an evolving system. Because of the ability to track, in real time, the use or non-use of any of the new additions it would be a true experiment, the outcome of which can be accurately measured. If it should lead to the standardization of few dozen symbols that prove not as popular as predicted, then we would conclude a failure of the experiment, and retire this process. Otherwise, I'd have no problem cautiously continuing with it. But then, I remember when folks used to cite the WG2 Principles and Procedures document for examples of what was and was not a good candidate for encoding. That seems so long ago now. The PP, like most by-laws and constitutions, are living documents. In this case, they try to capture best practice, without taking from the UTC (or WG2) the ability to deal with new or changed situations. The degree to which emoji have captured the popular imagination is unprecedented. It means the game has changed. Let's give the UTC the space to work out appropriate coping mechanisms. A./ PS: this does not mean that, for all other types of code points, the existing wording on the PP can simply be disregarded. In fact, the end result will be to see them updated with additional criteria explicitly geared towards the kind of high-profile use case we are discussing
Re: Unicode encoding policy
William_J_G Overington wjgo underscore 10009 at btinternet dot com wrote: 5. Are the proposed characters in current use by the user community? No This appears to be a major change in encoding policy. This, in my opinion, is a welcome, progressive change in policy that allows new characters for use in a pure electronic technology to be added into regular Unicode without a requirement to first establish widespread use by using an encoding within a Unicode Private Use Area. It is exactly the change I was worried about, the precedent I was afraid would be set. I feel that it is now therefore possible to seek encoding of symbols, perhaps in abstract emoji format and semi-abstract emoji format, so as to implement a system for communication through the language barrier by whole localizable sentences, with that system designed by interested people without the need to produce any legacy data that is encoded using an encoding within a Unicode Private Use Area. Sadly, I can no longer state with any confidence that such a proposal is out of scope for Unicode, as I tried to do for a decade or more. -- Doug Ewell | Thornton, CO, USA | http://ewellic.org ___ Unicode mailing list Unicode@unicode.org http://unicode.org/mailman/listinfo/unicode
VS: Unicode encoding policy
Mr. Overington, The question of support for localizable sentences has been raised by you on several occasions. For a number of valid reasons, It has never received any noticeable support, let alone the kind of support that you are asking for now. Sincerely, Erkki I. Kolehmainen Tilkankatu 12 A 3, 00300 Helsinki, Finland Mob: +358400825943, Tel / Fax (by arr.): +358943682643 Lähettäjä: Unicode [mailto:unicode-boun...@unicode.org] Puolesta William_J_G Overington Lähetetty: 23. joulukuuta 2014 19:58 Vastaanottaja: unicode@unicode.org Aihe: Unicode encoding policy Unicode encoding policy There is a document. http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2014/14250.htm Within the document, the following are interesting items. E.1.7 Emoji Additions: popular requests [Edberg, Davis, L2/14-272] Discussion. UTC took no action at this time. Later, in the same document is the following. E.1.7 Emoji Additions: popular requests [Edberg, Davis, L2/14-272R] [141-C6] Consensus: Add the block U+1F900..U+1F9FF Supplemental Symbols and Pictographs for Unicode version 8.0. The referenced document contains links to various requests and petitions for additional emoji characters. In the referenced document, within section C, is the following. 5. Are the proposed characters in current use by the user community? No This appears to be a major change in encoding policy. This, in my opinion, is a welcome, progressive change in policy that allows new characters for use in a pure electronic technology to be added into regular Unicode without a requirement to first establish widespread use by using an encoding within a Unicode Private Use Area. I feel that it is now therefore possible to seek encoding of symbols, perhaps in abstract emoji format and semi-abstract emoji format, so as to implement a system for communication through the language barrier by whole localizable sentences, with that system designed by interested people without the need to produce any legacy data that is encoded using an encoding within a Unicode Private Use Area. A first draft petition could be produced and then later drafts developed by consensus and, when drafting has produced a document for an initial core system then a petition could be submitted to the Unicode Technical Committee. Once in use, the system could have additional symbols added to it, gradually, so as to expand its capabilities as needs are identified. So I am writing to ask if people on this mailing list would be interested in discussing and perhaps encouraging and participating in the development of this system please? William Overington 23 December 2014 ___ Unicode mailing list Unicode@unicode.org http://unicode.org/mailman/listinfo/unicode
RE: Unicode encoding policy
True, however as William points out, apparently the rules have changed, so it isn’t unreasonable to ask again whether the rules now allow it, or if people that dismissed the idea in the past would now consider it. Personally, I think this is the wrong place for it, and as has been suggested numerous times, it makes sense to host the discussion elsewhere among interested parties. Although, I am not interested in the general case, there is a need for specialized cases. Just as some road sign symbols are near universal, there is a need for symbols for quick and universal communications in emergencies. Identifying places of safety or danger on a map, or for the injured to describe symptoms, pains, and the nature of their injury (or first aid workers to discuss victims’ issues), or to describe the nature of a calamity (fire, landslide, bomb, attack, etc.), etc. William, You might consider identifying where there are needs for such universal text, and working with groups that would benefit, to get support for universal text symbols. tex From: Unicode [mailto:unicode-boun...@unicode.org] On Behalf Of Erkki I Kolehmainen Sent: Tuesday, December 23, 2014 2:02 PM To: wjgo_10...@btinternet.com; unicode@unicode.org Subject: VS: Unicode encoding policy Mr. Overington, The question of support for localizable sentences has been raised by you on several occasions. For a number of valid reasons, It has never received any noticeable support, let alone the kind of support that you are asking for now. Sincerely, Erkki I. Kolehmainen Tilkankatu 12 A 3, 00300 Helsinki, Finland Mob: +358400825943, Tel / Fax (by arr.): +358943682643 Lähettäjä: Unicode [mailto:unicode-boun...@unicode.org] Puolesta William_J_G Overington Lähetetty: 23. joulukuuta 2014 19:58 Vastaanottaja: unicode@unicode.org Aihe: Unicode encoding policy Unicode encoding policy There is a document. http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2014/14250.htm Within the document, the following are interesting items. E.1.7 Emoji Additions: popular requests [Edberg, Davis, L2/14-272] Discussion. UTC took no action at this time. Later, in the same document is the following. E.1.7 Emoji Additions: popular requests [Edberg, Davis, L2/14-272R] [141-C6] Consensus: Add the block U+1F900..U+1F9FF Supplemental Symbols and Pictographs for Unicode version 8.0. The referenced document contains links to various requests and petitions for additional emoji characters. In the referenced document, within section C, is the following. 5. Are the proposed characters in current use by the user community? No This appears to be a major change in encoding policy. This, in my opinion, is a welcome, progressive change in policy that allows new characters for use in a pure electronic technology to be added into regular Unicode without a requirement to first establish widespread use by using an encoding within a Unicode Private Use Area. I feel that it is now therefore possible to seek encoding of symbols, perhaps in abstract emoji format and semi-abstract emoji format, so as to implement a system for communication through the language barrier by whole localizable sentences, with that system designed by interested people without the need to produce any legacy data that is encoded using an encoding within a Unicode Private Use Area. A first draft petition could be produced and then later drafts developed by consensus and, when drafting has produced a document for an initial core system then a petition could be submitted to the Unicode Technical Committee. Once in use, the system could have additional symbols added to it, gradually, so as to expand its capabilities as needs are identified. So I am writing to ask if people on this mailing list would be interested in discussing and perhaps encouraging and participating in the development of this system please? William Overington 23 December 2014 ___ Unicode mailing list Unicode@unicode.org http://unicode.org/mailman/listinfo/unicode
Re: Unicode encoding policy
On 2014/12/24 09:50, Tex Texin wrote: True, however as William points out, apparently the rules have changed, I hope the rules get clarified to clearly state that these are exceptions. so it isn’t unreasonable to ask again whether the rules now allow it, or if people that dismissed the idea in the past would now consider it. Personally, I think this is the wrong place for it, and as has been suggested numerous times, it makes sense to host the discussion elsewhere among interested parties. Although, I am not interested in the general case, there is a need for specialized cases. Just as some road sign symbols are near universal, Actually not. I have been driving (and taking drivers' licences tests) in Switzerland, Japan, and the US. There are lots of similarities, but it'd be difficult for me to come up with an example where they are all identical (up to glyph/design differences). Please see for yourself e.g. at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_signs_in_Switzerland http://www.japandriverslicense.com/japanese-road-signs.asp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Road_signs_in_the_United_States In the US, there are also differences by state. there is a need for symbols for quick and universal communications in emergencies. Identifying places of safety or danger on a map, or for the injured to describe symptoms, pains, and the nature of their injury (or first aid workers to discuss victims’ issues), or to describe the nature of a calamity (fire, landslide, bomb, attack, etc.), etc. Such symbols mostly already exist. For a quick and easy introduction, see e.g. http://www.iso.org/iso/graphical-symbols_booklet.pdf. If use of such symbols is found in running text, or if there is a strong need to use them in running text, some of these might be added to Unicode in the future. But they wouldn't be things invented out of the blue for marketing purposes, they would be well established already. William, You might consider identifying where there are needs for such universal text, and working with groups that would benefit, to get support for universal text symbols. So the first order of business for William (or others) should be to investigate what's already around. Regards, Martin. ___ Unicode mailing list Unicode@unicode.org http://unicode.org/mailman/listinfo/unicode
