On 5 Apr 2017, at 15:52, Garth Wallace <[email protected]> wrote: > […] I'm just saying that if having symbols without VS not match either of the > VSes is a sticking point, it's not hard to work around.
Oh, I see. 😅 Well, yes, I agree with you in part. But here’s the thing. It is *permissible* for proportional-inline-chesspieces to be identical to emsquare-chessboard-chesspiece if a designer *wants* to do it that way. But it is *just* as permissible for proportional-inline-chesspieces to be truly proportional and unsuitable for chessboard typesetting (and that’s how it has been since Unicode 1.1). Look, here is a choice: U+2654 - WHITE CHESS KING whose width might or might not be U+2654 FE00 - WHITE CHESS KING whose glyph is a white/light em-square for chessboards U+2654 FE01 - WHITE CHESS KING whose glyph is a black/dark em-square for chessboards I think this is enough. Or it could be: U+2654 - WHITE CHESS KING whose width might or might not be U+2654 FE00 - WHITE CHESS KING whose glyph is the same as the unmodified U+2654, whatever it is U+2654 FE01 - WHITE CHESS KING whose glyph is a white/light em-square for chessboards U+2654 FE02 - WHITE CHESS KING whose glyph is a black/dark em-square for chessboards There’s some precedent for this, where some symbols have one VS for “text glyph” and a different VS for “emoji glyph” and of course the unmodified symbol can be used and will display as the font has it. I don’t think the second is necessary. It’s not necessary for this, for example: U+0030 - DIGIT ZERO U+0030 FE00 - short diagonal stroke form U+0030 FE0E - text style U+0030 FE0F - emoji style OK, “text style” is identical to unmodified U+0030, but the only reason that attribute exists is in distinction to “emoji style”. Compare also: U+1000 - MYANMAR LETTER KA U+1000 FE00 - dotted form >>> Currently, chess fonts can be (roughly) divided into "diagram fonts" and >>> "notation fonts”. >> >> That’s not true. There are some which do all three. > > There are, sure. I said roughly: many don't do both & rely on font-switching. But even more of them can’t rely on font-switching because the encoding of the piece on light and dark chessboard varies from supplier to supplier. All current chess fonts are ASCII hacks. >>> None of the features required for a diagram font are unacceptable in >>> figurine notation: >> >> The white ones may be too wide for use in text. > > Not visually ideal, but legible. Yes but if we were to unify unmodified chesspieces with the pieces on white squares it could invalidate the metrics of text like http://evertype.com/standards/unicode-list/34-variantim.png As I say, it’s *permissible* to have the unmodified chesspiece glyph be the same as the white-square chesspiece glyph, but it’s not obligatory, and we must preserve font designer choice here. Michael Everson
