<table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0" ><tr><td valign="top" style="font: inherit;">But is this keyboard so expensive because of the technology or because of the "design" (which, by the way, I find to be fairly conservative :-)) )<br><br>Wilfred<br><br>--- On <b>Tue, 4/5/10, John Was <i><john.was@ntlworld.com></i></b> wrote:<br><blockquote style="border-left: 2px solid rgb(16, 16, 255); margin-left: 5px; padding-left: 5px;"><br>From: John Was <john.was@ntlworld.com><br>Subject: Re: [XeTeX] Em-dash<br>To: "Unicode-based TeX for Mac OS X and other platforms" <xetex@tug.org><br>Date: Tuesday, 4 May, 2010, 5:23 PM<br><br><div id="yiv37509273">
<style></style>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS">Hello</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS">Well if money is no object try
this:</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS"><a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://www.artlebedev.com/everything/optimus/">http://www.artlebedev.com/everything/optimus/</a></font></div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS">Unfortunately I'm too busy emptying my bank
account with important things like wind-up gramophones....</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS">In case of difficulty, don't forget the third
way of communicating with the computer - SHOUT.</font></div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS">John</font></div>
<div> </div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS"></font> </div>
<div><font face="Arial Unicode MS"></font> </div>
<blockquote style="border-left: 2px solid rgb(0, 0, 0); padding-left: 5px; padding-right: 0px; margin-left: 5px; margin-right: 0px;">
<div style="font: 10pt arial;">----- Original Message ----- </div>
<div style="font: 10pt arial; background: none repeat scroll 0% 0% rgb(228, 228, 228);"><b>From:</b>
<a rel="nofollow" title="wvanrooijen@yahoo.com" ymailto="mailto:wvanrooijen@yahoo.com" target="_blank" href="/mc/compose?to=wvanrooijen@yahoo.com">Wilfred van
Rooijen</a> </div>
<div style="font: 10pt arial;"><b>To:</b> <a rel="nofollow" title="xetex@tug.org" ymailto="mailto:xetex@tug.org" target="_blank" href="/mc/compose?to=xetex@tug.org">Unicode-based TeX for Mac OS X and other
platforms</a> </div>
<div style="font: 10pt arial;"><b>Sent:</b> Tuesday, May 04, 2010 9:11 AM</div>
<div style="font: 10pt arial;"><b>Subject:</b> Re: [XeTeX] Em-dash</div>
<div><br></div>
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<tr>
<td valign="top">Hi all,<br><br>This seems to be precisely the issue.
Xetex can read and understand all unicode characters, but at this time,
the only way to communicate with the computer is through the keyboard
and the mouse. Thus, there will always be issues with "special
characters". I don't know if it exists, and if not it may be interesting
to develop, but a keyboard with LCD keys would be nice. Then one can
switch layout, and the characters on the keys appear differently. Of
course, there would still be strange side-effects, such as a CJK space,
which is really a 2-byte space, and xetex does not treat it as a regular
space (rather, treats it like ~, I
suppose).<br><br>Cheers,<br>Wilfred<br><br>--- On <b>Tue, 4/5/10, Juan
Francisco Fraile Vicente <i><juanfranciscofv@gmail.com></i></b>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote style="border-left: 2px solid rgb(16, 16, 255); padding-left: 5px; margin-left: 5px;"><br>From:
Juan Francisco Fraile Vicente
<juanfranciscofv@gmail.com><br>Subject: Re: [XeTeX]
Em-dash<br>To: "Unicode-based TeX for Mac OS X and other platforms"
<xetex@tug.org><br>Date: Tuesday, 4 May, 2010, 4:48 PM<br><br>
<div id="yiv227909979">Which is that compose key on Linux?
<div><br></div>
<div>I think all of you have a part of reason, but we have to remember
that one of the best things of the world of TeX is the multiple
options that offers. Erasing that conventions would be a
loss. </div>
<div>Although I agree (it's difficult to see --- sometimes and the
source code may result in low readability), XeTeX is everyday more
known for linguists that work with several languages. And the great
characteristic of XeTeX is a more comfortable environment for working
with several languages (that it is possible in LaTeX, but some time
ago it was not so easy for some of us if working with Unicode).</div>
<div>Many people working with documents in several languages have the
same problem: it's necessary to change again and again between
language-keyboard. And every keyboard usually puts diacritical marks,
dashes, points and other chars where the designer wanted/preferred. In
this way those methods of LaTeX are very productive: LaTeX accents,
for instance, make much easier to put vocalic quantities in Latin, or
marks for textual criticism in Greek like a point under a greek
letter. These are two examples only, and I agree with some of
you that suggest to learn the keyboard distribution, but sometimes
it's more difficult than it seems (for instance, in Spain we have our
own distribution, specially different because it includes our 'ñ', and
if I change to Greek layout on Linux is really different and few
intuitive for Spanish users). I am designing a layout for Ancient
Greek for Spanish keyboard and people who will use it will have to
learn where I put the em-dash for instance, but if they work with
XeTeX and those codes of LaTeX, this question is independent of the
keyboard, the system or the editor, I think.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Sorry if I have made any mistake talking about XeTeX, I will be
always a **TeX learner...</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Best regards,</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Juan Francisco <br><br>
<div class="gmail_quote">2010/5/4 Andrew Moschou <span dir="ltr"><<a rel="nofollow">andmos@gmail.com</a>></span><br>
<blockquote style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;" class="gmail_quote">On Linux, there is the compose key, on Mac, there
is the option/alt key, and both are very convenient. On Windows,
there are the alt key codes but these are very inconvenient, instead
you can use the program AllChars (<a rel="nofollow" target="_blank" href="http://allchars.zwolnet.com">allchars.zwolnet.com</a>) which imitates the behaviour
of the compose key. I use these methods and have learnt the few
combinations that represent the common unicode characters (dashes
and quote marks apart from accented letters).<br><br>I would argue
that using the proper characters increases readability of the source
code: e.g. J\"urgen Strau\ss{} is harder to read than Jürgen
Strauß.<br><br>The tricky thing about the various dashes is that,
with a monospaced font, it is hard to work out what sort of dash you
are looking at (they're all the same length).<br><font color="#888888"><br>Andrew</font>
<div>
<div></div>
<div class="h5"><br><br>
<div class="gmail_quote">On 4 May 2010 13:15, Wilfred van Rooijen
<span dir="ltr"><<a rel="nofollow">wvanrooijen@yahoo.com</a>></span>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;" class="gmail_quote">I'd have to somehow input the character
directly, and I am sure that there are ways to do that, but those
will not increase readability of the source code
:-))</blockquote></div><br></div></div><br><br><br>--------------------------------------------------<br>Subscriptions,
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