[tldoc] Russian translation (texlive-ru)

[Reinhard Kotucha]

On 2017-04-02 at 22:42:00 +0900, Norbert Preining wrote:

 > Now that I am in Japan and have to fight with Katakana, which is
 > purely pronounciation based, I have to say, it is not better at
 > all.  Trying to guess what the locals hear and transcribed into
 > Katakana is one of the worst things. I can read novels, newspapers,
 > all with Kanjis by now, but Katakana is still a real pain in the
 > ass.

Katakana is quite useful though.  Consider the cheap LCD displays
which do not support more than 128 or 256 characters.  Most of these
stupid displays are made in Japan, BTW. :)

When I encounter Japanese texts (usually data sheets of electronic
components) I see that a lot of Kanjis are used.  Thus I believe that
Hiragana and Katakana were never supposed to replace Kanji and do not
represent exact pronunciation.  A former Japanese colleague used
Katakana in order to spell the name of the company but he used Kanji
in order to write his own name.  

Korean is completely different.  Hangul is an artficial script,
designed by a few scientists abt. 600 years ago.  It's quite perfect
in the sense that Koreans rarely need Chinese characters, if at all.

What I will never understand is how people can remember Chinese or
Arabic characters.  At TUG-2006 in Marrakesh I was proud that I
recognized the Arabic word for "Coca Cola", at least.  Well, it was
ubiquitous.

Norbert, do I meet you at TUG-2017?

Regards,
  Reinhard

-- 
------------------------------------------------------------------
Reinhard Kotucha                            Phone: +49-511-3373112
Marschnerstr. 25
D-30167 Hannover                    mailto:reinhard.kotucha at web.de
------------------------------------------------------------------