Re: [idn] Thoughts on nameprep

[Bruce Thomson]

No, Macs have only a 10%-15% market share in Japan. But the Mac's Japanese-input routines are less trouble-prone than IME, in my opinion. Also, IME comes standard with Windows2000. It's only older platforms where people are using 3rd-party Japanese input software. Bruce "J. William Semich" wrote: > > Don't a large number of computer users in Japan (the majority?) use Mac > computers, which support direct input of the local character set from the > keyboard, without IME? > > Tech staff here use an iMac running the Japanese version of Mac OS for > Japanese (multilingual) domain name testing purposes just for that reason. > > Bill Semich > > At 10:43 PM 3/15/01 +0900, Bruce Thomson wrote: > >I can help out with the Japanese keyboard explanation. When typing > >in Japanese you have a choice of several keyboard input packages > >available, of which IME is the most popular. Without IME or equivalent, > >you would be limited what is on the keyboard itself, which is basically > >your standard ASCII. With IME, you are able to type a whole range of > >hiragana, katakana, Kanji, and special symbols, all by typing alphabetics > >and then converting. > > > >The default input mode is hiragana, which lets you type sequences of > >hiragana > >by typing the equivalent alphabetics. For example, type r and a to get the > >single hiragana character pronounced ra. You can then either confirm the > >hiragana character, add additional hiragana to the sequence, or press > >the space bar to convert it into something else. It converts it into what > >it guesses is my most likely choice, and I can press the space bar again > >to get the next choice. Pressing space a third time gives me a menu with > >all possible choices. With "ra", I get 13 menu choices: the original > >full-width hiragana, 4 Kanji, full-width katakana, half-width katakana, > >and the alphabetic sequences RA, Ra, and ra, in both full-width and > >half-width alphabetics. Whichever choice I make, IME remembers it as my > >preferred choice, bringing it to the top of the list of choices next > >time I convert the same characters. > > > >IME can be quite annoying in its attempts to be intelligent, remembering > >previous choices which were exceptions, or typed by someone else borrowing > >my computer, etc. So it's certainly possible for it to encourage mistakes > >by leading you to input something you didn't intend. > > > >At this point user names and passwords are probably without exception > >limited to ASCII, but depending on what software you use to enter them > >it might be possible to accidentally type Kanji, kana, or full-width > >alphanumerics. So people learn to be careful. > > > >As to why people still might use double-width numbers (or alphabetics, > >for that matter), some people seem to feel that they look better > >when intermixed with Kanji text (which is full width). Personally > >I don't use them, but some people do. The only reasonable use I have > >seen for half-width kana recently is on cell phones, because of the > >limited screen size. These non-standard characters are not used > >for non-text input such as user names, passwords, credit card > >numbers, telephone numbers, zip codes, etc. > > > >If someone gave me the opportunity to work on the Japanese keyboard spec, > >I would like to consider trying to wean people off these old characters > >by refusing to convert to them (this could be a checkbox option). You > >can always type them if you desperately need them by switching keyboard > >modes. Currently in addition to the default mode I described above, there > >are modes for typing katakana, ASCII, full-width alphanumerics, and > >half-width kana directly without the conversion step. I expect that > >creators of proportional fonts would then work to make mixtures of > >alphabetics and Kanji blend more smoothly. > > > >Bruce > > > >"D. J. Bernstein" wrote: > >> > >> Yoshiro YONEYA writes: > >> > 'intelligent IME' > >> eel > >> Could you please explain this in more detail? How does the typical > >> Japanese keyboard interface work? > >> > >> What exactly do you type if you want to connect by FTP to ftp.aol.com > >> and log in as anonymous with password [EMAIL PROTECTED]? What would you > >> expect to type if aol and the username and the password were replaced by > >> Japanese names? > >> > >> Suppose we settle on fast nameprep: it's the keyboard interface's job to > >> help you type good domain names, so that other programs don't have to > >> worry about bad domain names. What changes would you make in the > >> keyboard interface to support this? > >> > >> > Half-width kana will be obsolete > >> > >> So, if we take the slow nameprep approach, then in twenty years we'll > >> have a bunch of networking programs with the useless skill of converting > >> half-width kana to full-width kana. Right? > >> > >> As for numbers, Bruce seemed to say that most applications expect ASCII > >> digits, and that double-width numbers won't work. If that's correct, why > >> is anybody using double-width numbers? > >> > >> ---Dan > > > >