[Freebangfont-devel] Re: HELP

[Kaushik Ghose]

Hi,
I'm not sure if I explain the situation to your satisfaction, but I'm
cc-ing a list that has people who can probably explain it better.

So there are two (partly separate) issues here

1. Encoding
2. Fonts

1.
The encoding that Lekho uses for bangla is unicode
(http://www.unicode.org) This has become the most widely adopted character
coding standard for international text. It has drawbacks and limitations,
but as far as bangla goes I'd say it is the best solution in the context
of multi script text.

The encoding that Ekushey and MS word uses for bangla, that you are using,
is as far as I understand NOT unicode. Basically ms word documents store
font information with the actual text. So word/ekushey do not encode
bangla as unicode, but use an arbitrary code and a font to render bangla.

This means that typing bangla with the ekushey fonts and saving the text
as a .doc document will let only ms word (and perhaps Open office) read
that document, and not as unicode bangla , but as tetx in a paticulr font
(supplied with Ekushey)
Lekho CAN NOT read .doc files

Saving a bangla document in Lekho will let you read it in a program that
supports unicode AND implements the standard rigourously. I hear the
latest versions of microsoft word do this.

2.
BUT you need at least one bangla open type font to be able to see this
text. Bangla open type fonts are available here

http://www.nongnu.org/freebangfont/downloads.html

Ekushe will NOT (as far as I know) be able to help you edit unicode
documents. Ekushey does not use unicode.

My suggestion, if you are not worried about your encoding standard, and
are most concerned about the layout of what you type is to use Ekushey and
MS word and ask for help from Robin Upton (the creater of Ekushey) to
modify the key map to suit you more

thanks
-kaushik

 On Wed, 14 May 2003, S K Bhattacharya wrote:

> Dear Sir,
> Here is the screen shots from which you will understand how Lekho typed
> material get distorted when saved as word file.
> My objective is to easily type bangla material in your program and save it
> as word file to edit it with Ekushe program(which runs in MS Word) for
> convenience. That is why I need it to be saved as word file correctly and
> open it as it is.
> Please suggest me how can all these changes be rectified.
> With best wishes
> S K Bhattacharya
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Kaushik Ghose" <address@hidden>
> To: "S K Bhattacharya" <address@hidden>
> Sent: Saturday, May 10, 2003 12:18 AM
> Subject: Re: HELP
>
>
> > Hello Dr. Bhattacharya,
> > First I want to make sure I have got the files correctly. When I open both
> > the files in lekho I get the identical thing (no differences). The screen
> > shot is enclosed.
> >
> > Is this what you see ?
> >
> > Can you send me a screen shot of what you see in Lekho ? and what you see
> > in word ?
> >
> > I don't have word 2002 , so I can't check it on my machine .
> >
> > Also, have you tried saving the page as HTML and looking at it in IE6 ?
> >
> > thanks !
> > -kaushik
> >
> >
> >
> > On Fri, 9 May 2003, S K Bhattacharya wrote:
> >
> > > Dear Sir,
> > > With your suggestion I tried to save Lekho page in WORD 2002 in my PC
> which
> > > supports utf-8 format. But the matter has been distorted which you will
> find
> > > by comparing the two.For your comparison I am sending both the files
> > > herewith.
> > > Please give me your necessary suggestion after going through the whole
> > > thing.
> > > With best wishes,
> > > Dr S K Bhattacharya.
> > >
> > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > From: "Kaushik Ghose" <address@hidden>
> > > To: "S K Bhattacharya" <address@hidden>
> > > Sent: Wednesday, May 07, 2003 9:13 PM
> > > Subject: Re: HELP
> > >
> > >
> > > > Hello Dr. Bhattacharya,
> > > >
> > > > On Wed, 7 May 2003, S K Bhattacharya wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > Dear Sir,
> > > > > I have installed Lekho v1.15 in my computer having P4 processor with
> > > windows ME os and running it smoothly.The Phonetic procedure(Keyboard
> > > mapping) in your software is simply excellent. I like it very much.But
> there
> > > are some constraints.One such is format(utf-8) in which the files are
> being
> > > saved is not capable of opening the files in other applications like
> BANGLA
> > > WORD, BANGLA TYPER or MS WORD. Moreover when I am  trying to copy Lekho
> > > pages in all this applications they are not also being copied  except in
> MS
> > > WORD.But in MS WORD the content of the file is getting distorted
> too(some
> > > words get changed). Since I am new about utf-8/utf-16 format there may
> be
> > > some mistake in my operation.
> > > > > So, I will request you to kindly help me in this regard.
> > > > >
> > > > Glad to hear you are finding the software useful...
> > > >
> > > > > I have some questions also:
> > > > > 1.Can I be able to type Bangla in your application and save the
> matter
> > > in GIF or other easy text format and open them with other applications
> > > without any change?
> > > >
> > > > So GIF is a image format, or does this refer to some other text format
> ?
> > > > Lekho saves the file in Unicode, which is the current standard for
> > > > international text.
> > > > I'm not sure what formats BanglaWord, BanglaTyper etc. use, but if
> they
> > > > use unicode then they should be able to read the files.
> > > >
> > > > Lekho doesn't use any proprietary format, so the hope is you should be
> > > > able to read files created by it with all modern applications.
> > > >
> > > > As an example on the windows platform IE 6 can read unicode pages (eg
> > > > pages created by lekho), but you need bangla open type fonts for that.
> > > > These fonts are available from the free bangla fonts project
> > > > http://www.nongnu.org/freebangfont/
> > > >
> > > > Also, the latest versions of MS word (from MS offcie 2000) (I hear)
> have
> > > > unicode support, and bangla unicode support in particular, so a recent
> > > > copy of MS word, with the bangla Open Type fonts from the free bangla
> > > > fonts project, should work...
> > > >
> > > > There are some small bugs with the way lekho saves unicode (eg
> > > > chandrabindu) I'm fixing that, but have not released the new version
> of
> > > > Lekho yet.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > 2.Why spell checking is covering very few words?
> > > >
> > > > The spell checker is in a farily primitive stage, but the dictionary
> it
> > > > uses has about 80,000 words, (I think). Could you give more details on
> > > > this problem ?
> > > >
> > > > > 3.Is there any other Word Processor (with spell checker) which
> follow
> > > same phonetic procedure as in your programme?
> > > >
> > > > I don't know of any other software that uses a spell checker. If you
> work
> > > > on X (linux, unix etc) Dr. Avijit Das has a program called
> bengaliwriter,
> > > > which has a spell checker. I used the word list from that program.
> > > >
> > > > > 4. Is your phonetic Keyboard Layout compatible with Ekushe
> software?. If
> > > so please tell me how?
> > > >
> > > > Actually, no. One of the thinsg todo for lekho is to change the
> keyboard
> > > > layout files to a more "stardard" format.
> > > >
> > > > thanks
> > > > -kaushik
> > > >
> > > >
> > >
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