bugUnifont - Bugs: bug #52107, Problems with Saurashtra

 
 

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bug #52107: Problems with Saurashtra

Submitter:  David Corbett <dscorbett>
Submitted:  Sun 24 Sep 2017 01:47:13 PM UTC
   
 
Category:  None Severity:  3 - Normal
Item Group:  None Status:  Works For Me
Privacy:  Public Assigned to:  None
Open/Closed:  Closed

Fri 24 Jul 2020 02:25:04 AM UTC, comment #4: 

David,

One example is Harfbuzz, and the situation has gotten worse recently because now Pango only uses Harfbuzz for font rendering.  The Pango maintainers dropped FreeType support without soliciting public comment or even communicating with the FreeType maintainer to see if he wanted to help them work out a solution.  And this has propagated to GNOME, which quickly adopted that new version of Pango (and as a result I am no longer using GNOME, but that is a tangential matter).  That hasty decision has left font rendering on GNU/Linux less than what it could be.

So in general I think there needs to be a decent alternative to Pango that will still render Type 1 fonts (and I still use some Type 1 fonts privately that I created, and even Type 3 fonts but those are PostScript), BDF, etc.  That isn't going to be solved right away though.  Some have talked about forking Pango but I don't know if that will have long-term viability.

In addition, I thought Fontforge development would wind down by now.  There has been talk for several years of other free font rendering engines being "the new Fontforge", yet as of today Fontforge is still actively maintained.

In the end regardless, I am hoping to not increase the complexity of Unifont.  Providing consistent combining character information in a predictable way will help software that chooses to use it.  The Harfbuzz maintainer does not want to fully support TrueType, to the point where he was one of the two Pango developers that removed FreeType from Pango without the above-mentioned solicitation of public comment or even contacting the FreeType maintainer.  So for now if a code point is a combining code point, I at least want to have that information in the font in a consistent form and hopefully the degradation in font support in the GNU/Linux community will improve with non-Pango alternatives.  If they do, the combining information will still be in Unifont.

Thank you,


Paul Hardy

Paul Hardy <unifoundry>
Group administrator
Mon 20 Jul 2020 07:37:53 PM UTC, comment #3: 

Which font rendering engines are you thinking of specifically?

David Corbett <dscorbett>
Sat 11 Aug 2018 06:12:29 AM UTC, comment #2: 

I am marking this as "works for me" because the changes suggested will not render correctly given the shortcomings in the common font rendering engines. In particular, removing combining characters from combining character data files will not have the desired effect in common font rendering engines. If an individual glyph is incorrect, please submit a separate bug report.

Thank you,


Paul Hardy

Paul Hardy <unifoundry>
Group administrator
Mon 30 Jul 2018 03:37:16 AM UTC, comment #1: 

I have gone back to leaving all combining glyphs in combining.dat files, if nothing else because some font rendering engines are making up their own minds about combining glyph placement.  As a consequence, I think this is too tangled a mess for a font that is not a full, high-resolution vector font with intelligent double- and triple-glyph placement.  Because of the limitations inherent in Unifont, further complicated by different rendering engines interpreting (or not interpreting) the combining character information differently, I intend to leave Saurashtra as it is.  The same holds for Ahom.

Paul Hardy <unifoundry>
Group administrator
Sun 24 Sep 2017 01:47:13 PM UTC, original submission:  

A Saurashtra syllable may consist of a consonant, a hāru, a vowel sign, and a syllable-final mark. Sixteen pixels too narrow for that, especially as some of the vowel signs are wider than some of the consonants. To make Saurashtra legible, all the General_Category=Spacing_Mark characters should have spacing glyphs. The exception is U+A8B4 SAURASHTRA CONSONANT SIGN HAARU, since no mark can precede it, so there is no reason it shouldn’t be combining.

The independent vowels and the consonants therefore need not be left-aligned. The independent vowels should be centered. The consonants should be nearly centered, leaving space for the hāru.

U+A8B6 SAURASHTRA VOWEL SIGN I should be lower. It is supposed to ligate with its base; it can’t in Unifont, so the closest it can get is to be at the same level as the top of the base.

The stroke protruding from the top right of U+A8B9 SAURASHTRA VOWEL SIGN UU should come from the loop on the right, not from the middle.

The bottom of U+A8BA–A8BB SAURASHTRA VOWEL SIGN VOCALIC R/RR should be wider than the top.

U+A8BC SAURASHTRA VOWEL SIGN VOCALIC L, U+A8BD SAURASHTRA VOWEL SIGN VOCALIC LL, and U+A8C3 SAURASHTRA VOWEL SIGN AU should be as wide as consonants.

U+A8BE SAURASHTRA VOWEL SIGN E, U+A8BF SAURASHTRA VOWEL SIGN EE, and U+A8C0 SAURASHTRA VOWEL SIGN AI should be a little wider.

U+A8C4 SAURASHTRA SIGN VIRAMA should be below the consonant.

The candra of U+A8C5 SAURASHTRA SIGN CANDRABINDU should curve more around the bindu. Even though its general category is Nonspacing_Mark, U+A8C5 should have a spacing glyph: it overhangs the right side of its base character but also has some space of its own. Ideally, it would be partly combining and partly spacing, but since Unifont doesn’t support that, the best is to be spacing. Some of the examples in its Unicode proposal show it to completely spacing, so I don’t think this is a bad solution.

U+A8CE SAURASHTRA DANDA and U+A8CF SAURASHTRA DOUBLE DANDA have extra white space on the sides.

A880:00000000001028281000000000000000
A881:00000000102828100010282810000000
A882:000000000000000006C00920092000400F801000101010200FC0000000000000
A883:000000000000000006C00920092000400F801020101010280FC0000000000000
A884:00000000000000000C601290148010400C201020102010400F80000000000000
A885:00000000000000000C60129014E010400C201020102010400F80000000000000
A886:000000000000000019E006100520098012401040104010800F00000000000000
A887:000000000000000019C006200510099012501050105010900F10000000000000
A888:00000000000000000990125012500C5000900F10101010200FC0000000000000
A889:00000000000000000980124012400C4000800F20101010280FC0000000000000
A88A:00000000000000000EE0111011101010101017D01090111008E0000000000000
A88B:00000000000000000EE0111011101010101017D01090111008E000C0042003C0
A88C:000000000000000007E00810100012601290129011E008800700000000000000
A88D:000000000000000007E008101010149015501550139009100610000000000000
A88E:000000000000000007E00810100015201550155012E008400780000000000000
A88F:000000000000000007E0081013C01420122010C01320082007C0000000000000
A890:000000000000000007E008101390145012501090135008500790000000000000
A891:00000000000000000FC010202700289024A8212826F010900F30000000000000
A894:0000000000000000338044404440444044404440444044403980000000000000
A895:0000000000000000188025402940208019402140222022201CC0000000000000
A896:00000000000000003F80404040405C4022405C40404040402180000000000000
A897:000000000000000030804940284008407C402080408041003E00000000000000
A898:000000000000000031804A405140404038404080408041003E00000000000000
A899:00000000000000003B804440444040405040684048404A403180000000000000
A89A:00000000000000003B8044404A40514051404A4044404A402480000000000000
A89B:00000000000000000F00108022402540254023E0244024801300000000000000
A89C:00000000000000007FC020001C00030038804440484040803F00000000000000
A89D:00000000000000001F0020804040404040404040404020801F00000000000000
A89E:00000000000000003FC000801100238044404040404020801F00000000000000
A89F:000000000000000001004280224012C029402040204010800F00000000000000
A8A0:00000000000000001F0020804640494049405D40414022401C80000000000000
A8A1:00000000000000001F0020804040404040404040404020401840000000000000
A8A3:00000000000000000F0010801080090002000C40102010600F90000000000000
A8A4:000000000000000031804A405040404030404040404040803F00000000000000
A8A5:00000000000000001E8021404180410041005100290029001100000000000000
A8A6:0000000000000000218050400840088010801100210022001C00000000000000
A8A7:00000000000000000C0012C021C0210042004A40444020801F00000000000000
A8A8:00000000000000002D802E40184000801F002040202020201FC0000000000000
A8AA:000000000000000036404940494022400C40304040405C402380000000000000
A8AB:0000000000000000218050402840088010801100210022001C00000000000000
A8AC:00000000000000007BC00A00090011001080208020407C406380000000000000
A8AD:00000000000000003B8044404440404040404040404040403180000000000000
A8AE:000000000000000071804040208011000A0004000A000A000400000000000000
A8AF:00000000000000001C80224042404A4054404A40424042403180000000000000
A8B0:0000000000000000308049406940508041404140424022401C80000000000000
A8B1:000000000000000024405A804C80488044404440424042404180000000000000
A8B2:00000000000000007F8008001000388054404840404020801F00000000000000
A8B3:000000000000000035804A404A40404040404040404040803300000000000000
A8B5:000000005C2428081010202018000000
A8B6:00788448000000000000000000000000
A8B7:70880808080808080808080A04000000
A8B8:00000000442A3A341028282810000000
A8B9:00000004482C3A341028282810000000
A8BA:000000001C2A24201C0202423C000000
A8BB:000000001C2A24201C0202423C807C02
A8BC:00000000000000000EF011081108110811381148114811480930000000000000
A8BD:00000000000000000EF01108110811081138114811481148093020001FC00020
A8BE:000000003C4242463A02020438000000
A8BF:000000007E422408101422221C000000
A8C0:000000003C424A463A021A2418000000
A8C1:000000007C4424087010101408000000
A8C2:000000007E462A0A720A0A0A04000000
A8C3:00000000000000003E302248127003C00E401240224012480C30000000000000
A8C4:0000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001000080
A8C5:92AA9244380000000000000000000000
A8CE:00000000080808080808080808000000
A8CF:00000000242424242424242424000000

Remove from plane00-combining.txt:

A880
A881
A8B5
A8B6
A8B7
A8B8
A8B9
A8BA
A8BB
A8BC
A8BD
A8BE
A8BF
A8C0
A8C1
A8C2
A8C3
A8C5

David Corbett <dscorbett>

 

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    Date Changed by Updated Field Previous Value => Replaced by
    2018-08-11 unifoundry StatusNone Works For Me
        Open/ClosedOpen Closed

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