At 15:48 -0400 2005-08-10, Peter T. Daniels wrote:

> > >Why would anyone _want_ to write Vai with a computer?
>>
>> Wow. That's a pretty condescending view.
>
>Are Muslims "condescending" because a Qur'an that's not written out by
>hand isn't a legitimate copy of the Qur'an?

No, *you* were condescending wondering why anyone would *want* to
write Vai with a computer. A strict analogy of this statement with
the Qur'an would be to wonder why anyone would *want* to enter the
Qur'an into a computer.

Your analogy is false: nobody suggested that Vai written on the
computer wasn't valid.

> >To produce the Vai encoding proposal, I used a number of 8-bit fonts.
> >And one could do that in 1993 too. (In 1993 there were no Vai fonts,
> >though.)
>
>using more than one font for one script was utterly impractical. We
>tried it momentarily for one of the extended Arabics (Sindhi, probably),
>but quickly went to composite characters instead.

It's true that mixing 8-bit fonts is a bit of a pain. But the typeset
result is finer.
--
Michael Everson * http://www.evertype.com