Am Montag, 13. August 2012 um 14:24 schrieb Michael Everson: ME> On 13 Aug 2012, at 12:37, Karl Pentzlin wrote: >> Why is U+25CA ◊ LOZENGE in the "Mac OS Roman" character set (at 0xD7 = 215, >> and therefore contained in several common fonts like Arial or Times New >> Roman)? ME> Because they put it there in 1984.
My intent is to get information *why* the character was considered that important at that time to be included into an 8-bit character set with its limited space. The problem I am confronted with is that this character shares its German name "Raute" with the "#", and I have to consider any historical use of the (real) lozenge when describing the "#" in a keyboard-related German publication I have to make. (The name "Raute" for "#" seems to derive from the International Telecommunication Union standard ITU-T E.161, which requires the name "square, or the most commonly used equivalent term in other languages" for the sign on the lower right corner of 12-key telephone keypads, which is translated into "Raute" instead of literally "Quadrat". The term "square" is also used that way in the name of U+2317 VIEWDATA SQUARE, which is a "straight #" like it is in fact shown on most telephone keypads.) - Karl
