4.0133 SGML; Graphic Mode v. Text Mode for Greek Fonts (2/52)
Elaine Brennan & Allen Renear (EDITORS@BROWNVM.BITNET)
Fri, 25 May 90 17:32:20 EDT
Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 4, No. 0133. Friday, 25 May 1990.
(1) Date: Thu, 24 May 90 18:40:30 EDT (37 lines)
From: "Steven J. DeRose" <EL407011@BROWNVM>
Subject: SGML
(2) Date: Thu, 24 May 90 18:56:07 EDT (15 lines)
From: cb%kcp.UUCP@XAIT.Xerox.COM (Christopher Bader)
Subject: 4.0126 Greek Fonts
(1) --------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Thu, 24 May 90 18:40:30 EDT
From: "Steven J. DeRose" <EL407011@BROWNVM>
Subject: SGML
In response to Tim Bryson's query (and in quest of the briefest
clear description):
SGML = "Standard Generalized Markup Language", ISO 8879: 1986(E).
SGML defines a standard means of providing markup for the structure
of documents. With it you can declare names for whatever units you
wish to divide a document into, and then mark the divisions.
For example, you can declare that a <book> consists of a <title> and
any number of <chapter>s, that chapters consist of certain other things,
and on down to character data.
An SGML-supporting application can then unambiguously parse documents,
and apply whatever semantics are appropriate to the current use.
SGML itself says *nothing* about those semantics.
A word-processor might interpret the element <title> to mean:
18-point bold Helvetica, with page break before.
But an information retrieval system might give this meaning instead:
Counts double for the importance of contained words.
SGML's treatment of character encoding issues is basically limited
to declaring reference names for many, many characters, for use
when those characters are not part of the standard character set.
They are intended for use in interchange, or for encoding occasional
uses of the characters, not primarily for encoding non-Latinate texts.
See section D.4 of the standard.
Other International standards relevant to character encoding include
ISO 646, 2022, 8859, and 10646.
(2) --------------------------------------------------------------26----
Date: Thu, 24 May 90 18:56:07 EDT
From: cb%kcp.UUCP@XAIT.Xerox.COM (Christopher Bader)
Subject: 4.0126 Greek Fonts
Dennis Cintra Leite is quite correct about PC's in graphics mode. I
should have said that the screen cursor on a PC cannot back up in text
mode.
Text mode is the mode that matters, however, to users of e.g. Nota Bene.
The Greek screen fonts of Nota Bene are necessarily incomplete because
each combination of vowels, accents, breathings, macrons, and subscripts
must be represented by its own one-byte code, and there just aren't
enough one-byte codes to represent all the possibilities and still
accommodate the rest of the Greek alphabet.