[XeTeX] MakeIndex

[Yves Codet]

Hello.

Le 16 juin 06, ~{($~} 15:46, Ross Moore a ~{(&~}crit :

> It may be that   icase.ist   does not provide enough info by itself,
> but needs to be input along with other  .ist  files.
>
> In any case, my point was that studying the use of  ,ist  files may 
> lead
> to a solution on how to define appropriate sorting orders.
> It's not a problem that I've explored in any real depth.
>

It's probably the case, but using kpsewhich I can only find three .ist 
files (gglo.ist, gind.ist, nomencl.ist) in my gwTeX tree. None of them 
is about sorting, and I'm unable to find where sorting rules are 
defined.

icase.ist has rules such as:

	sort_rule	"A"		"a"

If I run it on a test .idx file, case is actually ignored but the .ilg 
file contains messages like:

	** Input style error (file = 
/Users/ycodet/Library/texmf/makeindex/icase.ist, line = 19):
   		 -- Unknown specifier sort_rule.

I'm not sure I understand. It can't mean that MakeIndex performs a task 
with rules it doesn't know of?

On the other hand, if I create an .ist file with rules such as

	sort_rule	"a"		"A"
	sort_rule	"~{(!"		"B"

then there's no sorting. Would it be because MakeIndex can't handle 
utf-8?

That behaviour of MakeIndex is fairly strange. What puzzles me even 
more is that nobody seems to have the same problem as I. I was unable 
to find any hint on the Web about the way one can sort lists in an 
arbitrary order with the usual programming languages. I can't believe 
that people who write in Arabic, Armenian... never had to create an 
index, unless they're all resigned to do it the old way.

Best wishes,

Yves