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Author Topic: Priorities for future font development  (Read 3006 times)
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« on: 2007-01-14, 23:02:00 »

Posted by: John Hudson
         
I've been discussing possible future font development projects with SBL and with some members of the Font Foundation, and would like to invite members of the community to comment on preferred priorities. Below is a list of some of the additional scrips or type styles that have been mentioned to date. Please let me know which of these you consider most important to your work, or feel free to suggest other possibilities. If you have a very specific preference, it would be helpful to know what sort of work you are doing that requires such fonts.

• Armenian font
• BibLit (Latin, apparatus sigla, etc) Bold and Bold Italic fonts
• Old Canaanite / Palaeo-Hebrew
• Coptic, Sahidic (ancient) style
• Coptic, Bohairic (ecclesiastic) style
• Ethiopic (Ge'ez)
• Georgian*
• Greek Bold and Bold Italic fonts
• Greek uncial font (codex style)
• Hebrew Bold font
• Syriac, Estrangelo style
• Syriac, Serto style
• Syriac, Eastern style
• Ugaritic

* I am interested to know which style of the Georgian script is most important for scholars working with Georgian gospels.

         
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« Reply #1 on: 2007-01-15, 12:34:00 »

Posted by: karyn_t
         
Thanks for the opportunity to voice our priorities. I've listed my priorities.

1. Hebrew Bold font
2. Greek Bold and Bold Italic fonts
3. BibLit (Latin, apparatus sigla, etc) Bold and Bold Italic fonts
4. Ugaritic
5. Old Canaanite / Palaeo-Hebrew
6. Syriac, Estrangelo style

#1, 2, and 3 are the most anxiously awaited for. 

Karyn Traphagen


         
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« Reply #2 on: 2007-01-15, 01:09:00 »

Posted by: JudyRedman
         

First, John, thank you (and whoever else is involved) in the work
you are doing in font development.  It's much
appreciated.

 

Some comments on font development priorities:

 

1.  I notice that bold and italic fonts are not included
automatically in the development of SBL fonts.  I am wondering how much
extra work this would be and therefore how long it would delay the release of
the font?  When writing papers/chapters/sections on the use of a particular
word it is very useful to be able to include the word in the same formatting as
the rest of the heading, so it would be really good if they were included in the
default brief for the development of fonts.  If I were asked to chose one
or the other, I'd chose to have bold rather than italic because I think that a
non-bold word in the middle of a line of bold looks far odder than a non-italic
word which is in another script does in the middle of a line of
italic.

 

2.  Because of the nature of my work (and I suspect that of
many others), I often need to type a word or phrase in another script in the
middle of English sentences.  It is easier to do this if I only need to
change keyboard mapping, rather than both keyboard mapping and font.  It
would therefore be good if all the non-Latin fonts included a full set of Latin
characters (with bold and italic) as well as the characters for that particular
alphabet.  Thus, when working primarily in English and Coptic, with the
occasional Greek word thrown in, I could change from English to Coptic by simply
using the keyboard shortcut to change keyboards and only need to swap fonts as
well when I wanted to add Greek or Hebrew.  I assume that this is the game
plan, but just wanted to say so. :-)

 

Regards

 

Judy






From: SBL Fonts
  [mailto:SBLFonts@groups.msn.com]
Sent: Monday, 15 January 2007
  11:35 AM
To: SBL Fonts
Subject: Re: Priorities for future
  font development








New Message on SBL Fonts


Priorities for future font development








Reply






 Recommend Message 2 in
                Discussion






From: karyn_t

Thanks for the opportunity to voice
                our priorities. I've listed my priorities.
               


1. Hebrew Bold font

2. Greek Bold and Bold Italic
                fonts

3. BibLit (Latin, apparatus sigla, etc) Bold and
                  Bold Italic fonts

4. Ugaritic

5. Old Canaanite / Palaeo-Hebrew

6. Syriac, Estrangelo
                  style


#1, 2, and 3 are the most anxiously awaited
for. 



Karyn Traphagen



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« Reply #3 on: 2007-01-15, 01:34:00 »

Posted by: JudyRedman
         

Hi John,

 

I am interested in the Sahidic Coptic (ancient style) font for my
work on the Gospel of Thomas.  There are several other people here at UNE
who would also be interested in this font for work on various of the Nag Hammadi
texts.  One is also working on Manichaen texts in
Subachmimic.  As far as I am aware there's no demand here for an
ecclesiastical Coptic font.

 

Judy






From: John Hudson [mailto:tiro@tiro.com]
 
Sent: Monday, 15 January 2007 10:02 AM
To: SBL
  Fonts
Subject: Priorities for future font
  development








New Message on SBL Fonts


Priorities for future font development








Reply






 Reply to Sender   Recommend Message 1 in
                Discussion






From: John Hudson

I've been discussing possible future
                font development projects with SBL and with some members of the
                Font Foundation, and would like to invite members of the
                community to comment on preferred priorities. Below is a list of
                some of the additional scrips or type styles that have been
                mentioned to date. Please let me know which of these you
                consider most important to your work, or feel free to suggest
                other possibilities. If you have a very specific preference, it
                would be helpful to know what sort of work you are doing that
                requires such fonts.

• Armenian font
• BibLit (Latin,
                apparatus sigla, etc) Bold and Bold Italic fonts
• Old
                Canaanite / Palaeo-Hebrew
• Coptic, Sahidic (ancient)
                style
• Coptic, Bohairic (ecclesiastic) style
• Ethiopic
                (Ge'ez)
• Georgian*
• Greek Bold and Bold Italic
                fonts
• Greek uncial font (codex style)
• Hebrew Bold
                font
• Syriac, Estrangelo style
• Syriac, Serto style
•
                Syriac, Eastern style
• Ugaritic

* I am interested to
                know which style of the Georgian script is most important for
                scholars working with Georgian
        gospels.

View other groups in this
    category.




         
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« Reply #4 on: 2007-01-15, 02:22:00 »

Posted by: twuandy
         
Boy, Judy,
If you only want to switch one thing, and you're working in left-to-right
scripts, why not just do like I do - put shortcut labels for your fonts on
your Word toolbar and bang on them?  Then you only switch keyboards to go
from left-to-right scripts to right-to-left and vice-versa.  You type your
English in Times-Roman: "As Thomas says in his gospel" then bang on IAE
Coptic on the toolbar, type in the quote, then bang on Times-Roman on the
toolbar and continue in English.  Give John breathing-room for worthwhile
tasks - like a Dead Sea Scroll Hebrews font, maybe a compromise between or a
combination of IQIsaiah-a and 4QSam-a.  That would save me alot of useless
fiddling with a Wacom pen to show how signs in ancient Hebrew can be
confused with each other and with Greek uncial letters (that's a second
option, since in Codex Vaticanus they often differ from modern capital Greek
letters).  Ian Scott and Ken Penner want somebody to type up Jubilees
(Ge'ez) for their online Pseudepigrapha.  But I think they have a font.  
Since Dead Sea scrolls don't have vowels, you could include in one font a
few glyphs for each letter and still have room for the uncial Greek of Codex
Vaticanus.  Cursive Greek is a little more problematic.  You'd probably need
a whole font to map the different letter-forms in the five Lucianic
manuscripts of 1-2 Samuel.
Andrew Fincke


>From: "JudyRedman"
>Reply-To: "SBL Fonts"
>To: "'SBL Fonts'"
>Subject: Re: Priorities for future font development
>Date: Sun, 14 Jan 2007 17:34:16 -0800
>
>
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>
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>     New Message on SBL Fonts
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>       Priorities for future font development
>
>
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>       Reply
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>                Â 
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>                   Reply to Sender
>                     Recommend
>
>                   Message 4 in Discussion
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>               From:
>               JudyRedman
>
>
>
>
>
>Hi John,
> 
>I am interested in the Sahidic Coptic (ancient style) font for my
>work on the Gospel of Thomas.  There are several other people here at UNE
>who would also be interested in this font for work on various of the Nag
>Hammadi
>texts.  One is also working on Manichaen texts in
>Subachmimic.  As far as I am aware there's no demand here for an
>ecclesiastical Coptic font.
> 
>Judy
>
>
>
>
>   From: John Hudson [mailto:tiro@tiro.com]
>
>Sent: Monday, 15 January 2007 10:02 AM
>To: SBL
>   Fonts
>Subject: Priorities for future font
>   development
>
>
>
>
>
>
>       New Message on SBL Fonts
>
>
>
>   Priorities for future font development
>
>
>
>
>
>         Reply
>
>
>
>
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>                
>               Reply to Sender   Recommend
>               Message 1 in
>                 Discussion
>
>
>
>
>
>               From: John Hudson
>
>
>I've been discussing possible future
>                 font development projects with SBL and with some members
>of the
>                 Font Foundation, and would like to invite members of the
>                 community to comment on preferred priorities. Below is a
>list of
>                 some of the additional scrips or type styles that have
>been
>                 mentioned to date. Please let me know which of these you
>                 consider most important to your work, or feel free to
>suggest
>                 other possibilities. If you have a very specific
>preference, it
>                 would be helpful to know what sort of work you are doing
>that
>                 requires such fonts.
>
>• Armenian font
>• BibLit (Latin,
>                 apparatus sigla, etc) Bold and Bold Italic fonts
>• Old
>                 Canaanite / Palaeo-Hebrew
>• Coptic, Sahidic (ancient)
>                 style
>• Coptic, Bohairic (ecclesiastic) style
>• Ethiopic
>                 (Ge'ez)
>• Georgian*
>• Greek Bold and Bold Italic
>                 fonts
>• Greek uncial font (codex style)
>• Hebrew Bold
>                 font
>• Syriac, Estrangelo style
>• Syriac, Serto style
>•
>                 Syriac, Eastern style
>• Ugaritic
>
>* I am interested to
>                 know which style of the Georgian script is most important
>for
>                 scholars working with Georgian
>         gospels.
>
>View other groups in this
>     category.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>     View other groups in this category.
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« Reply #5 on: 2007-01-15, 03:53:00 »

Posted by: John Hudson
         
Thanks for the comments so far.

Judy, the new version of the Hebrew font and the Greek fonts will contain a basic Latin character subset, which will probably suffice for most English text. The aim was to provide support for the legacy 8-bit codepages that include ASCII alongside of Hebrew and Greek characters. I'm afraid some font switching is unavoidable for the time being, though, and I recommend the kind of custom keyboard shortcut solution that Andy suggests. In the long-term, it may be possible to do all work for Latin, Greek and Hebrew scripts using only the SBL BibLit font, but that will rely on support for OpenType language-specific glyph variants, which is lacking in most of today's applications.

The italic fonts for Latin and Greek are included in the initial font development, but the intention is to release the regular fonts as soon as they are ready, and the italics later. Italics are a higher priority than bold simply because of their articulatory use in the typography of most European languages. But there is a lot of call for bold from Font Foundation members, so I think you can expect these to follow.

When you say that one of your colleagues is working with Manichaean texts, does this mean that there would be interest in a Manichaean font? The Manichaean script is not encoded in Unicode yet, but it has been proposed (revised proposal, 2002) and is on the roadmap. I will try to find out what the current status is.
         
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« Reply #6 on: 2007-01-15, 09:16:00 »

Posted by: Midres1
         

Dear John,
My priorities for
future font development would be:
1. Greek Bold and Bold Italic fonts
2.
BibLit-Latin as comprehensive as possible (including transliteration and
phonetic glyphs)

3. Hebrew bold

In response to
Judy's concern I want to mention the "Antioch classical languages utility"
(Denis Liégeois, Ralph Hancock) that I am using for Unicode font and character
switching (Greek, Hebrew and Coptic).  It makes it very easy. If you
are not familiar with the program you can read more about it at this link: http://www.users.dircon.co.uk/~hancock/antioch.htm.

 

I would also be interested in
hearing from listers about other utilities they have found helpful for font
usage.

 

Dieter

         
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« Reply #7 on: 2007-01-15, 10:30:00 »

Posted by: JudyRedman
         
John,
 
I will check with my colleagues about Manichaean font and get back to you.
One of them is working on a research project with colleagues from several
other Australian universities, but she's on leave until next week.
 
Judy


  _____  

From: John Hudson [mailto:tiro@tiro.com]
Sent: Monday, 15 January 2007 2:53 PM
To: SBL Fonts
Subject: Re: Priorities for future font development


 
s.msn.com>
     New
Message on SBL Fonts    
     


 
ussion&parent=1&item=428> Priorities for future font development


 
font%20development> Reply
     
 
elopment> Reply to Sender
d&parent=1&item=434> Recommend    Message 6 in Discussion    

From:   John
Hudson    

Thanks for the comments so far.

Judy, the new version of the Hebrew font and the Greek fonts will contain a
basic Latin character subset, which will probably suffice for most English
text. The aim was to provide support for the legacy 8-bit codepages that
include ASCII alongside of Hebrew and Greek characters. I'm afraid some font
switching is unavoidable for the time being, though, and I recommend the
kind of custom keyboard shortcut solution that Andy suggests. In the
long-term, it may be possible to do all work for Latin, Greek and Hebrew
scripts using only the SBL BibLit font, but that will rely on support for
OpenType language-specific glyph variants, which is lacking in most of
today's applications.

The italic fonts for Latin and Greek are included in the initial font
development, but the intention is to release the regular fonts as soon as
they are ready, and the italics later. Italics are a higher priority than
bold simply because of their articulatory use in the typography of most
European languages. But there is a lot of call for bold from Font Foundation
members, so I think you can expect these to follow.

When you say that one of your colleagues is working with Manichaean texts,
does this mean that there would be interest in a Manichaean font? The
Manichaean script is not encoded in Unicode yet, but it has been proposed
(revised proposal, 2002) and is on the roadmap. I will try to find out what
the current status is.   

View other groups in this   category.




     



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« Reply #8 on: 1969-12-31, 19:00:00 »

Posted by: JudyRedman
         

Dieter,

 

Thanks for the information about Antioch.  I just installed
it and tried it, but unfortunately what it does is to add a few extra characters
to a Greek-style font. This means that while you can type all the
characters in a form that is recognisable to most scholars, it
does't produce the ancient style Sahidic/Subachmimic characters that are
expected in the work I am doing. :-( 

 

Regards

 

Judy






From: Midres1
  [mailto:dieter.mitternacht@teol.lu.se]
Sent: Monday, 15 January
  2007 8:17 PM
To: SBL Fonts
Subject: Re: Priorities for
  future font development








New Message on SBL Fonts


Priorities for future font development








Reply






 Reply to Sender   Recommend Message 7 in
                Discussion






From: Midres1


Dear John,
My
                priorities for future font development would be:
1. Greek
                Bold and Bold Italic fonts
2. BibLit-Latin as comprehensive
                as possible (including transliteration and phonetic
                glyphs)

3. Hebrew
                bold

In response to Judy's concern I want to mention
                the "Antioch classical languages utility" (Denis Liégeois, Ralph
                Hancock) that I am using for Unicode font and character
                switching (Greek, Hebrew and Coptic).  It makes it
                very easy. If you are not familiar with the program you can read
                more about it at this link: http://www.users.dircon.co.uk/~hancock/antioch.htm.

 

I would also be
                interested in hearing from listers about other utilities they
                have found helpful for font usage.

 

Dieter

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    category.




         
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« Reply #9 on: 2007-01-15, 11:26:00 »

Posted by: twuandy
         
Dear Judy,
I'm the last to be impertinent.  The steps to getting font tabs on your
toolbar are:
1) Hit the small downward pointed triangle or the triplet of such at the end
of the toolbar;
2) Choose "Add/remove buttons";
3) When the "Customize" window appears choose "Commands";
4) In the "Categories" subwindow at the left choose "Fonts";
5) Drag the font(s) you want to the toolbar;
6) Hit "close"
As said, though, if you choose "Times New Roman" in this way after typing
your Coptic, the next time you switch to a Hebrew Keyboard, the font will
come up Times New Roman.  And you know where that takes us.
Andrew

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« Reply #10 on: 2007-01-15, 18:46:00 »

Posted by: Midres1
         
Judy,
I suspect that the problem you are desribing is due to the fact that Antioch activates a font that does not include the special characters you need. That does not have to be a problem, though, since you can tell Antioch to use and switch between whatever Unicode fonts you prefer. Check the Preferences/Text Window.
Dieter

         
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« Reply #11 on: 2007-01-15, 19:09:00 »

Posted by: John Hudson
         
Dieter,

"2. BibLit-Latin as comprehensive as possible (including transliteration and phonetic glyphs)"

The BibLit font contains semitic transliteration glyphs, sigla for critical apparatus, textual markup characters as used in e.g. the Nestle-Aland NT, etc. so I'm hoping that it has most of what you need (it has almost 3,000 glyphs, so it should).

When you say 'phonetic glyphs', do you mean that you would find IPA support useful? This is outside of the current scope for the font, but I'd like to register interest in IPA if users want it.
         
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« Reply #12 on: 2007-01-15, 19:54:00 »

Posted by: Midres1
         

John,

 

3000 glyphs sounds plenty.
Great!

Concerning IPA I suppose it may be
too narrow an interest of mine and not find support by many others. In my
teaching of Greek I use modern Greek pronounciation and papyri spelling error
examples to demonstrate its appropriateness for Hellenistic Greek learning.

Of course, it would be
interesting to know how many more that have this "inclination".

Dieter


----- Original Message -----



Sent: Monday, January 15, 2007 8:54
  PM

Subject: Re: Priorities for future font
  development








New Message on SBL Fonts


Priorities for future font development








Reply






 Reply to Sender   Recommend Message 12 in
                Discussion






From: John Hudson

Dieter,

"2. BibLit-Latin as
                comprehensive as possible (including transliteration and
                phonetic glyphs)"

The BibLit font contains semitic
                transliteration glyphs, sigla for critical apparatus, textual
                markup characters as used in e.g. the Nestle-Aland NT, etc. so
                I'm hoping that it has most of what you need (it has almost
                3,000 glyphs, so it should).

When you say 'phonetic
                glyphs', do you mean that you would find IPA support useful?
                This is outside of the current scope for the font, but I'd like
                to register interest in IPA if users want
        it.

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    category.




         
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« Reply #13 on: 2007-01-16, 09:19:00 »

Posted by: James18343
         
John,

Our top priorities would be:

* Greek Bold and Bold Italic fonts
* Greek uncial font (codex style)

James

--------------------
James D. Ernest, PhD, Editor
Baker Academic
jernest@BakerAcademic.com
--------------------


 
-----Original Message-----
From: John Hudson [mailto:tiro@tiro.com]
Sent: Sunday, January 14, 2007 6:02 PM
To: SBL Fonts
Subject: Priorities for future font development

-----------------------------------------------------------

New Message on SBL Fonts

-----------------------------------------------------------
From: John Hudson
Message 1 in Discussion

I've been discussing possible future font development projects with SBL
and with some members of the Font Foundation, and would like to invite
members of the community to comment on preferred priorities. Below is a
list of some of the additional scrips or type styles that have been
mentioned to date. Please let me know which of these you consider most
important to your work, or feel free to suggest other possibilities. If
you have a very specific preference, it would be helpful to know what
sort of work you are doing that requires such fonts.

* Armenian font
* BibLit (Latin, apparatus sigla, etc) Bold and Bold Italic fonts
* Old Canaanite / Palaeo-Hebrew
* Coptic, Sahidic (ancient) style
* Coptic, Bohairic (ecclesiastic) style
* Ethiopic (Ge'ez)
* Georgian*
* Greek Bold and Bold Italic fonts
* Greek uncial font (codex style)
* Hebrew Bold font
* Syriac, Estrangelo style
* Syriac, Serto style
* Syriac, Eastern style
* Ugaritic

* I am interested to know which style of the Georgian script is most
important for scholars working with Georgian gospels.


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« Reply #14 on: 2007-01-16, 19:11:00 »

Posted by: da_ja_re
         
This is a welcome development! For my own work, my "priorities" would be:

1. BibLit (Latin, apparatus sigla, etc) Bold and Bold Italic fonts
2. Greek Bold and Bold Italic fonts
3. Old Canaanite / Palaeo-Hebrew

and that in spite of the fact that biblical Hebrew is what I do mostly! For whatever reason, I have almost zero need for Hebrew bold ... oddly! For me, filling out the BibLit "font family" is much in front of any other option just now.

In the "it would be great if" category comes Syriac, where options are quite limited just now.

Many thanks again to John Hudson (*is* there a team??!) for the fine work and for being so accessible in this forum.

Best wishes,
David Reimer




         
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