----- Original Message ----- From: "Peter Constable" Sent: Friday, May 28, 2004 10:58 PM
> > Is it really in the scope of Unicode to encode such trivialities? I > have > > a key ring with my name "written" in an Egyptian hieroglyphic > > pseudo-alphabet. Will such abuse of Egyptian hieroglyphs have to be > > taken into account in the possible Unicode proposal for this script? > > Why is that an abuse of hieroglyphs any more than Hebrew text > transliterated or transcribed in Latin characters, or Arabic text > transcribed in Hangul characters? Unicode is uninterested in what the > content of the text is; it encodes characters, not text. It is up to > users and implementers to decide what texts those characters can > represent. > > So, absolutely, it is in the scope of Unicode. > Just so Peter. These are not trivialities. Writing of 'foreign' words in the ancient context is not so different to the PtrKrk key ring. Modern artistic, creative or educational use of a script is an entirely valid consideration although I don't know of any instances in Hieroglyphs where this conflicts with a scholarly treatment except for the addtion of the <seated man/woman at computer> sign (for fun) in the GlyphScribe & Cleo Huggins hieroglyph fonts - safely ignorable by Unicode IMO but if there is user demand so be it.. If there were to be an Egyptian revival as with Hebrew (I'm not for an instant advocating the idea!) such novel characters would be essential and as such also a proper subject for Unicode. Bob Richmond Saqqara Technology
