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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 12/15/20 7:41 PM, Sławomir Osipiuk
wrote:<br>
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cite="mid:CAM+ijLjkNdAB15VykfVOsz7zGk-UqAd2Urzp+-O5w4d9w-LfdA@mail.gmail.com">
<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">On Tue, Dec 15, 2020 at 6:26 PM Mark E. Shoulson <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:mark@kli.org"><mark@kli.org></a> wrote:
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But how is that different from anything being proposed? If this idea were accepted as part of Unicode, then it *would* be a feature of Unicode, just as whatever is being proposed would be if it were accepted. How does it matter if italicizing something is marked by some new U+DEADBF characters or by existing tag characters?
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- Rather than a completely new method, it's "just" an extension of an
existing feature. (Tag syntax, scope, and default ignorability are
already defined in the Unicode standard)</pre>
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To me, using existing features instead of introducing something
completely new is a *good* thing.
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cite="mid:CAM+ijLjkNdAB15VykfVOsz7zGk-UqAd2Urzp+-O5w4d9w-LfdA@mail.gmail.com">
<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">- The syntax "naturally" discourages complicated format nesting.
Unicode may formally restrict format combos.</pre>
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<p>This is along the lines of preventing feature-creep by being
restrictive. But yes, making hard to make things really
complicated would be a good thing, and we already know how
complicated HTML can get.<br>
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<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">If you insist that Unicode-compliant text readers must show italics or bold when marked with such-and-such characters,
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Absolutely not!</pre>
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<p>Then maybe I'm not understanding the proposal. If we're encoding
italics as part of plain text, doesn't that mean that things that
display the text should display them in italics? If they're just
ignorable, and the text is (or should be) readable and sensible
without the italics, then why are we encoding them? Doesn't that
just make them a higher-level protocol?</p>
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<p>Do you mean applications *should* display italics but not all of
them *must*? There are grades of conformity, but I don't really
know how they are specified and applied. I guess all this is sort
of answered by the documentation you quote at the end of your
mail.<br>
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<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">Conversely, if you're okay with pseudo-markup, this should sound fine to you. Why doesn't it?
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"Not my first choice" is what I said. It's not bad, but its similarity
to HTML is not a good thing in my eyes, because it raises the question
"I can do this in HTML, why can't I do it in UnicodeML™?" and push for
more and more HTML features to be included. It encourages feature
creep, which I said I'm against. Familiarity is not always a good
thing.</pre>
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<p>That's a good point. Even if you have to push through extensions
to UnicodeML every time you want to support something that's in
HTML, people will still be more prone to do it because of
familiarity with HTML.<br>
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<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">(how would this markup interact with other markup, like HTML, I wonder?)
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(From the Unicode Standard, page 916, with [] additions by me; notice
how little the text changes)
"The rules for Unicode conformance for the tag characters are exactly
the same as those for any other Unicode characters. A conformant
process is not required to interpret the tag characters. If it does
interpret them, it should interpret them according to the standard—
that is, as spelled-out tags. However, there is no requirement to
provide a particular interpretation of the text because it is tagged
with a given language [or formatting]. If an application does not
interpret tag characters, it should leave their values undisturbed and
do whatever it does with any other uninterpreted characters.
[...]
"Implementations of Unicode that already make use of out-of-band
mechanisms for language [or format] tagging or “heavy-weight” in-band
mechanisms such as XML or HTML will continue to do exactly what they
are doing and will ignore the tag characters completely. They may even
prohibit their use to prevent conflicts with the equivalent markup."</pre>
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<p>Mmm. So in an HTML document, unicode-formatting should give way
to HTML formatting. Which probably means unicode-formatting needs
to be ignored altogether, and unicode-italic characters shouldn't
be italic (after all, HTML has them formatted upright). That is,
"ignore the tag characters completely," as you quote. That does
make sense, though we still basically have two independent markup
systems inhabiting the same text, which certainly feels weird.
But there already is some of that with BIDI-control characters
(also a kind of markup) vs dir="ltr" attributes in HTML elements.</p>
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<p>~mark<br>
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<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">
Sławomir Osipiuk
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