Re: script count?

At 08:53 -0500 2003-12-11, Peter T. Daniels wrote:

>cowan@... wrote:
>>
>> Peter T. Daniels scripsit:
>>
>> > Just the other day I had occasion to draw up a list of (1), and the
>> > total is ca. 32 (depending where you draw the line).
>>
>> The Roadmap makes it 52:
>
>What's "the Roadmap," and on what basis is this or that item included in
>the list or not?

http://www.unicode.org/roadmaps/ "These pages present proportional
maps of actual and proposed allocations to Unicode and ISO/IEC 10646."

>It omits Syriac

No it doesn't.

>and (apparently) Chinese,

No it doesn't. It lists CJK Unified Ideographs.

>and lists Japanese three times
>(Han "ideographs," hiragana, katakana),

It doesn't. It doesn't list "Japanese" at all.

>puts a country name ("Myanmar") for a language/script name,

At the request of the National Standards organization of the Union of
Myanmar. Many of us didn't like that, but that's the name which was
approved for the standard.

>lists at least one auxiliary phonetic system (Bopomofo)

Bopomofo is a script of its own.

>but not another (IPA),

IPA is the Latin script with extensions.

>includes quite a few that are marginal at best and probably fully
>obsolete -- in short, what's "the Roadmap"?

It is a map of actual and proposed allocations to the Universal
Character Set. It is an aid to the technical work of enabling people
to write the world's writing systems with computers.

> > In addition, the status of Blissymbolics, Sutton Signwriting,and Braille
>> is debatable.
>
>They're "scripts"?

They are ordered collections of graphic elements used to convey human
language in writing. Indeed they are worthy of study.
--
Michael Everson * * Everson Typography * * http://www.evertype.com