Hi,
On Mon, Aug 27, 2012 at 5:12 AM, Ivan Shmakov <oneing...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>> Rugxulo <rugx...@gmail.com> writes:
>>>>>> On Aug 23, 2012 12:14 PM, "Ivan Shmakov" <oneing...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> […]
>
> >> FWIW, I was thinking about making a combined “FreeDOS & Bloček” note
> >> for our SFD flyers (well, free software variant of PC DOS is not as
> >> impressive as a free software variant of PC DOS with a
> >> Unicode-enabled text editor),
>
> > But how useful is Unicode unless you have something to read / write?
> > Also, are you really needing to mix multiple languages / glyphs in
> > the same doc?
>
> Once, I've written a document which, while for the most part
> cyrillic, included more than a few passages in English and
> Latin. It's not a problem, as the latter two could be encoded
> in pure ASCII (as long as one doesn't care about, say, ae and
> oe), and thus all its extensions, but I guess that one of my
> future documents is likely to contain a few passages in
> Esperanto just as well, so…
My point was that Unicode isn't always available in a host OS (or
apps), and software that demands Unicode compliance is a bit too
stringent, IMHO, esp. when most people couldn't care less what
encoding is used for their text as long as it does the job.
BTW, you can use E-o in pure ASCII too. The "official" solution is to
use gh,ch,sh,hh,jh but nothing extra for 'u(', just plain 'u'. Thus,
it's easier to mechanically change, sort, etc. if you use (unofficial)
gx,cx,sx,hx,jx,ux instead.
> Bear in mind also that it's not only the script that matters —
> various typography (like: proper quotes, dashes, bullets) aren't
> universally available in unibyte encodings.
>
> > Or just need the end resulting encoding to be in popular, compatible
> > format? If only the latter, copy and paste and iconv / recode
> > etc. is sufficient.
>
> Sufficient, yes. Convenient, I doubt it.
I know, I'm just saying, instead of throwing out the baby with the
bathwater (and crazily considering all non-Unicode OSes like DOS as
obsolete, which some people do), it's more practical to do with such
workarounds, esp. when Unicode isn't a "hard" (technical) requirement.
> >> but was quick to find that I can't even try Bloček myself, as it
> >> requires me to use some proprietary software first!
>
> > Do you want me to repack it in .7z for you?
>
> Yes, please.
Okay, gimme a few minutes to double-check it, and then I'll upload it
to iBiblio.
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/edit/blocek/
BTW, I downloaded shareware versions of RARX 3.93 (32-bit) and old RAR
2.50 (16-bit) from Sac.sk. They don't seem compatible. At least, I
didn't find any obvious way to use the older 2.x compression methods
with 3.x. So that's a minor annoyance. I did unpack and recompress the
main Blocek.rar with 2.x, and the difference was quite minor, only
like 5 kb bigger, IIRC. "-s -ds -r -m5" were the 2.50 switches needed,
I think, for optimal size.
I get the vague impression that RAR would maybe let 2.x owners upgrade
to 3.x for free (though keyfile changed), but I'm not sure about the
reverse, esp. for 3.x-only owners. In other words, if Laaca really
wants to use RAR, I guess we should politely ask (without demanding)
that he use 2.x methods, but I don't know if that's practical or
realistic here. I also halfway want to try (and probably fail, sigh)
to compile Unar with DJGPP's Objective C, but you said it wasn't
mostly successful even under Linux. :-/
> > Most around here aren't as idealistic enough to avoid all proprietary
> > things. (I doubt any of us uses a Lemote MIPS a la RMS, much less
> > exclusively!)
>
> Well, neither do I use SeaBIOS (or TianoCore.) But using a
> proprietary archiver while the free software ones are so
> widespread is somewhat off the limits for me.
So you'd rather do without? (Not me!) Blame the developer, heh.
Actually, don't blame anyone. Use a workaround. Or just suck it up and
use "close enough" UNRAR 3.x. I know that's not ideal, but it's a far
from ideal world!!
> > If you want to edit Unicode in DOS, you have several options,
> > e. g. GNU Emacs 23.3 (DJGPP), Mined, Blocek, etc.
>
> Don't they all use VGA (EGA) text modes (and thus 256 or 512
> glyphs at one time)?
No. GNU Emacs (Unicode internally since 23.x) just displays digraphs,
e.g. "C>" for "C with circumflex". Mined will now color the "C" blue
to show that it's different (though if you use FreeDOS' cp853, you can
see it properly, e.g. "mined -u" will edit as UTF-8 but display
correctly under cp853). Both of those have internal E-o "x metodo"
support (easier to use, IMO) while Blocek relies on external KEYB ('^'
[chgjs] or AltGr 'u').
Actually, I hate to admit, but I've never really used Blocek much for
anything heavy, and I now notice that it doesn't even display properly
for me on this particular computer (Intel gfx?), seems to be
"unintentionally" split screen. ;-)
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