From: "A.K. Eyma" To: "Ancient Egyptian Language List" Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2008 17:52:52 +0200 >What would be really useful would be something along the lines >of Meeks' Année lexicographique, which unfortunately, was >published for only deux années. You could make it a database >to which anyone could add references (from any dates) to >publications that mention specific words. **Dr Meeks is moving his project to the internet; from EEF NEWS (489): -- Project "Dictionnaire Égyptian - Français" http://recherche.univ-montp3.fr/egyptologie/index.php?page=dictionnaire This project by Dr Dimitri Meeks and coworkers aims to produce a dictionary (Ancient Egyptian - French) that will remedy the shortcomings of the existing (English and German) dictionaries (which basically base themselves on the old WB with only minor and insufficiently referenced additions), by incorporating the most recent research and the lexicographical references collected by Dr Meeks over the past 30 years. [Cp. also an online article by Dr Meeks mentioned in EEF NEWS (451).] "Cette opération se fera non plus sur le dictionnaire publié, mais une grande base de données consultable en ligne. Cette base replacera chaque mot dans les différents contextes dans lesquels il est susceptible d'apparaître. (..) Au courant de l'année 2008, une maquette, présentant les premières pages du dictionnaire dans un état pratiquement définitif, sera mise en ligne sur le site." A "Fiche technique du dictionnaire" [a template of a sample dictionary entry] can be downloaded. --- I always found it amazing that there simply was no funding for his highly important ALEX series (I believe he published the first two at his own costs). I think your wiki(?) idea is a good one, and certainly developing software that allows every user to make such a lexicographic tool (with references) for his/her self -- instead of the card-in-shoebox principle. :o But perhaps such software alreay exists. Also, one could wonder who will use an online dictionary. When translating texts, you simply have to have a paper version like HWB, IMO, for practical reasons. The TLE is mainly used for Belegstellen, I presume, and so will Meeks's, plus for checking the more rare words and specialistic terms. So a 'Faulkner like' online dictionary might be used mainly by laypersons doing only occassional translating, and then a 'theme' dictionary may be more fitting, i.e. with the most prevailing titles, phrases, etc that people need to translate the texts on the most common museum objects. I cannot imagine that if you want to have a go at long texts, you would not buy a dictionary (multiple ones, in fact). The GlyphStudy project is mainly aimed at those not reading French or German, I take it, meaning Meeks and WB would then not help their public. Aayko Eyma ============================================================================== From: "Nicole B. Hansen" Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2008 13:30:28 -0500 (CDT) >Also, one could wonder who will use an online dictionary. >When translating texts, you simply have to have a paper version >like HWB, IMO, for practical reasons. I can only speak for myself, but since I started using the online TLA, I have rarely ever had to touch the hardcopy version of the WB unless I come across a reference to a specific page that I need to identify. True, the basic entries are simple, but the scanned cards are a gold mine of information that you can't find in the printed version. I use it most frequently in my teaching, when my students ask questions about particular words/writings etc. I go to the cards and can find long lists of variant writings, multiple examples of the words in full hieroglyphic context. In fact, I also teach my online students how to use it about halfway through the introductory Middle Egyptian course. I think it would be hard to surpass its content without a lot of effort. Also, there is a limit to what we can, and I believe should, do with the Egyptian language online until we get a real Unicode standard in place. Any efforts to create new content at this point will rely on images and/or Manuel de Codage. A lot of effort will have to be duplicated once the Unicode standard exists and in the meantime content will not have its optimal usefulness. In fact, it is really maddening to see so much effort being put into other digital projects devoted to the Egyptian language when we don't even have this essential foundation in place to build on. The Assyriologists have Unicode and it is kind of embarrassing that we Egyptologists are still stuck in the dark ages. Nicole B. Hansen, Ph.D. Egyptologist/E-learning developer ============================================================================== Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2008 14:44:29 -0400 From: msesheta To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening I do own multiple dictionaries (and multiple grammars and other resource books). My excitement about this project is based on the fact that I have bad eyesight. It was never very good and middle age has certainly had an impact. Thirty minutes with Faulkner and a magnifying glass is about my limit. An online dictionary would allow me to increase the size of the text and the glyph. Anyone who has ever had to study Egyptian by squinting at small glyphs under a bright light with a magnifier in one hand will appreciate this resource. Shelley A.K. Eyma wrote: > I cannot > imagine that if you want to have a go at long texts, you > would not buy a dictionary (multiple ones, in fact). > > > Aayko Eyma ============================================================================== From: "William Meriic" To: "'Ancient Egyptian Language List'" Subject: RE: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Date: Mon, 16 Jun 2008 13:41:25 -0500 Hello, > The GlyphStudy project is mainly aimed at those not reading > French or German, I take it, meaning Meeks and WB would > then not help their public. Maybe for the GlyphStudy project, I am not sure. That is run mostly in English. HOWEVER, The GOSP (which is a sister project of GlyphStudy) is developing software that _makes_ dictionaries. So, one can take any electronic sources (WB, Faulkner, Meeks, etc.) and using the GOSP software makes a dictionary in any format: PDF for printing, iPod (or other PDA) compatible format for use in the field, HTML for a website, SQL for a database, etc., in any language (English, French, German, Coptic, Greek, Proto-Hungarian, Linear A and even Linear B (but who reads B anymore), etc.). Consider the following example. Dr. Meeks is in the process of digitizing his/her documents. Meeks has two choices; digitize it into a static product such as PDF, Word, etc., or to enter it into a dynamic resource such as a database, or a CSV file. Static resources have the advantage of being directly consumed. When a PDF is made, it can be shipped to customers. However, all of the content is now lodged in that format. PDFs for instance are portable and easy to print, but lack complex (AE specific) search features and could not easily be integrated with other tools such as translators and lexical analyzers. If instead Dr. Meeks were to convert his document into a database of some sort (even a simple text file in a regular format such as CSV), then he would have unlimited options. The downside is he/she would need a tool such as ours to generate products that can be consumed. But, with that extra step, that data can be turned into dozens of products with minimal effort. For instance, the content could be laid out in a PDF intended for print. A website version could also be generated that allows for complex searches. The content could even be converted to integrate with computer-aided language tools. Multiple versions of the same content can be generated. In the case of PDF, a dictionary sorted in Gardiner order, and one in phonetic order could be made. One could be made that included cross-referenced variations, relations, etc., while one could leave that out in the interest of making a smaller version. > I always found it amazing that there simply was no funding > for his highly important ALEX series (I believe he published the > first two at his own costs). I am new to the Egyptology community (this is my first encounter; a good start huh?). I have found numerous sources that say this is a tough line of work. Now-a-days, with open source mentalities so prevalent, developing research and educations aids is becoming easier. While a tremendous amount of time an effort must still be put into research and content, there is a wealth of technologies freely available to reduce the cost of implementing and/or publishing these resources. The licensing of our software allows it to be used for commercial purposes. For example, Dr. Meeks is welcome to use our software to generate electronic products and sell those products without any permission from or compensation to us. In fact, we would appreciate an acknowledgment, but that is not a requirement either. Our software imposes no restrictions on the copyright holder of the content at all. In fact, if Dr. Meeks were to use our software, he would likely gain the benefit of several volunteers from the GOSP organization to help him/her use the software to meet the goals of Dictionnaire =C9gyptian - Fran=E7ais. Of course, Dr. Meeks should already have the digitization process planned out if they have already started the work. So, at this point we are probably too late. But you should get the idea. > I think your wiki(?) idea is a good one, and certainly developing > software that allows every user to make such a lexicographic > tool (with references) for his/her self -- instead of the card-in-shoebox > principle. :o But perhaps such software alreay exists. Yes, the software does exist. There are several wiki and similar style products designed for AE research freely available. Furthermore, our tools can help you generate these tools from your existing content. Please see our project site for more information on some of these tools. > Also, one could wonder who will use an online dictionary. > When translating texts, you simply have to have a paper version > like HWB, IMO, for practical reasons. I am not an archeologist, so I cannot say what it is like to be on site or at a museum doing research. However, if you are working on something from home/work, there are a number of tools that can do lexical analysis for you. The Projet Rosette, for instance, has a tool that allows you to enter text in MdC form. It will then run an analysis on the content and produce a list of definitions of the words found in the text. These results are fully cross-references. This tool is still in the early stages at the moment but shows where Computer Aided Egyptology can go. There are language analysis tools available for all modern languages. There hasn't been much of a movement to use those tools for ancient languages yet. However, with existing technology it would not take much to implement a toolset that can perform a complete grammatical analysis on selections of text (limited of course to our understanding of AE grammar). I am not long winded; I am passionate! :-) Will Meriic ============================================================================== Date: Tue, 17 Jun 2008 08:00:07 -0500 From: Robert Myers To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Subject: AEL Electronic Dictionaries Hi; Not only are the HieroWords and Hieropreter programs useful for those with less than perfect eyesight, they can be sifted by definitions as well as by transliterations. The option of sorting by Gardiner code is a tremendous advantage for one conducting non-expert research. Bob ============================================================================== From: "William Meriic" To: "'Ancient Egyptian Language List'" Subject: RE: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Date: Tue, 17 Jun 2008 08:16:47 -0500 Thank you for the suggestion. I will add a large-print version to our list. While it is true that one can increase the size of a font in PDF, it isn't often obvious how, and doesn't affect printing. A wonderful suggestion. Will ============================================================================== From: Carl Edlund Anderson Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Date: Tue, 17 Jun 2008 07:24:52 -0500 To: Ancient Egyptian Language List On 16 Jun 2008, at 13:30 , Nicole B. Hansen wrote: >> Also, one could wonder who will use an online dictionary. >> When translating texts, you simply have to have a paper version >> like HWB, IMO, for practical reasons. > > I can only speak for myself, but since I started using the > online TLA, I have rarely ever had to touch the hardcopy > version of the WB unless I come across a reference to a > specific page that I need to identify. I tend to agree. I can't speak about Egyptian specifically, since I'm still very much a beginner with reference to that language, but for other languages with which I'm more familiar I quite commonly use electronic versions of dictionaries or other sources (online or on my local drive) even if I actually also have printed versions of the same materials. The e-versions are just quicker and handier (for me). (Though to sit down and actually read through an article or book chapter or something, the printed version remains more practical). Still, I agree that the lack of a Unicode standard for encoding the glyphs will be a stumbling block for these kinds of projects -- though doubtless one that can be overcome in time. :) Cheers, Carl -- Carl Edlund Anderson http://www.carlaz.com/ ============================================================================== From: "A.K. Eyma" To: "Ancient Egyptian Language List" Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Date: Tue, 17 Jun 2008 19:47:06 +0200 I wrote: >Dr Meeks is moving his project to the internet; >from EEF NEWS (489): >Project "Dictionnaire Égyptian - Français" >http://recherche.univ-montp3.fr/egyptologie/index.php?page=dictionnaire To prevent misunderstandings: the above dictionary project housed at the University of Montpellier, and based upon Dr Meeks' personal lexical indexing over the past thirty years, will first publish a paper dictionary in French, containing the collected data in compacted format. And then the material will be put online in extended format, in a dynamic database. What I did not know (but just learned) is that paper versions in English and Arabic are also being planned, and that the database will not only be accessible in French, but also in English and Arabic. Aayko Eyma ============================================================================== Date: Wed, 18 Jun 2008 09:54:36 -0600 From: "Stan Thomas" To: "Ancient Egyptian Language List" Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening On Tue, Jun 17, 2008 at 6:24 AM, Carl Edlund Anderson wrote: > > > Still, I agree that the lack of a Unicode standard for encoding the glyphs > will be a stumbling block for these kinds of projects -- though doubtless > one that can be overcome in time. :) > > Cheers, > Carl > > -- > Carl Edlund Anderson > http://www.carlaz.com/ > Can Unicode handle things like scaling, orientation, rotation, cadrats and ligature necessary to reproduce the appearance of Egyptian texts? I guess Unicode has been very helpful for other languages. I know there has been much work done on a Unicode standard for hieroglyphics. I suppose you don't need all of those features to encode texts. I am just wondering what are the advantages and disadvantages of Unicode for hieroglyphics? -Stan ============================================================================== Date: Wed, 18 Jun 2008 17:28:03 +0200 From: Serge Rosmorduc To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Nicole B. Hansen a écrit : > Also, there is a limit to what we can, and I believe should, > do with the Egyptian language online until we get a real > Unicode standard in place. Any efforts to create new content > at this point will rely on images and/or Manuel de Codage. A > lot of effort will have to be duplicated once the Unicode > standard exists and in the meantime content will not have its > optimal usefulness. > > In fact, it is really maddening to see so much effort being > put into other digital projects devoted to the Egyptian > language when we don't even have this essential foundation in > place to build on. The Assyriologists have Unicode and it is > kind of embarrassing that we Egyptologists are still stuck in > the dark ages. > > Nicole B. Hansen, Ph.D. > Egyptologist/E-learning developer > > Well, Unicode is certainly useful (and for transliteration, it's an absolute necessity), but it is really not suited for encoding ancient languages themselves, especially hieroglyphs. The pace of the unicode process itself is really not suited for us. e.g. : you encode the mastaba of Ti, and you feel you absolutely need a variant of A19 which would be a woman. If you want to go the unicode way, you use an private zone code (and you need to change your font, and operating system really don't expect fonts to change a lot), which means you will have lots of problems sharing stuff. A specific encoding like the current MdC code, is reasonablly well suited for our uses, the only problem being the need of a system to register those codes. (On a practical side, I understand that, for some uses, hieroglyphs in unicode have their merit -- having an encoding for the basic signs will allow to create portable and lightweight PDF files, for instance, or to do some searches using general software and not specialised one ; but you can pretty well build an XML database, for instance, using MdC codes). Best regards, S. Rosmorduc (On the subject, I have already mentioned on this list an article I wrote a while ago: http://www.cairn.info/revue-document-numerique-2002-3-page-211.htm but there is a very interesting paper about encoding ancient languages in general by Carl-Martin BUNZ : http://unicode.org/notes/tn3/bunz-iuc17pap.pdf ) ============================================================================== From: Carl Edlund Anderson Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 07:26:05 -0500 To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Possibly one way forward is to work towards standardizing hieroglyphic representations within Unicode. I realize that will take a lot of space :) -- not to mention a lot of "human wrangling" amongst the Unicode Consortium ;) -- but so far computing has gotten faster and roomier, so the technical issues at least should be OK in the end. I would assume that genuine variants of glyphs would need separate encodings, but possibly things like rotating and scaling are best left to the type setter. The fact that a particular glyph is bigger or smaller in a particular context might be meaningful or not -- but that's true of the basic Roman alphabet as well, and Unicode doesn't worry about such things. But I'm no expert on the design of Unicode, nor the workings of the consortium, and it may well move to slowly to be helpful in the short term. However, even if relying on a database of glyphs for the moment, at some point in the future things could always be converted into Unicode, if and when that becomes a possibility. Cheers, Carl -- Carl Edlund Anderson http://www.carlaz.com/ ============================================================================== From: "Peter Wakefield Sault" To: "Ancient Egyptian Language List" Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 17:12:08 +0100 Wouldn't scalable vector graphics be a better bet than trying to squeeze the proverbial square peg of glyphs into the round hole of "truetype" fonts? Then anyone could contribute to a glyph database (supervised, of course). All that each glyph needs is a catalog number and accompanying interpretation. Peter Wakefield Sault info@odeion.org http://ww.odeion.org ============================================================================== From: "William Meriic" To: "'Ancient Egyptian Language List'" Subject: AEL Unicode and Hieroglyphs... Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 09:16:58 -0500 Actually, Unicode has only a limited role in transcription. For instance: - You transcribe text using MdC. - Your software converts the various MdC codes (Gardiner, phonetic, numeric, etc) into Unicode symbols. A compliant font is then used to render each glyph. - Your software then does scaling, rotations, etc. of those glyphs. So, the MdC transcription infrastructure still needs to be in place. While it is true that you could map codes directly to your keyboard very few of us have 7000 or even 500 keys. This is all very close to how the Chinese languages are typed. What Unicode brings to the table are: - Very efficient glyph rendering in terms of speed and memory usage; fonts are at the core of all modern operating systems. - A standard encoding of all AE fonts; you can use any compliant font with any compliant software product. - Integration with other programs; since the result is simply a string of Unicode characters, it can be placed into any software product that supports Unicode, like MS Word.* - Similarly, someone can open a document with AE and, so long as they have _a_ font, they can view it, without the need for special software. * The last point has some potential issues. Unicode can handle left-to-right, and right-to-left. It also has support for top-to-bottom versions. However, it would have a tough time with some AE groupings (i.e. t&w&t). As such, the standard is including hundreds of common groupings. The MdC program would automatically use these groupings instead of grouping manually. This allows the entire group to be represented by one character, making other programs happy. One major benefit of Unicode over MdC for storage is in text processing. For instance, if you want to search for uses of G1 in a corpus of text, you would have to consider that it might have been written A. If done right, the Unicode standard promote canonical spelling of phrases, where MdC allows a phrase to be spelled in several ways. Will Meriic ============================================================================== From: "Nicole B. Hansen" Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 09:45:24 -0500 (CDT) >Well, Unicode is certainly useful (and for transliteration, it's an >absolute necessity), but it is really not suited for encoding ancient >languages themselves, especially hieroglyphs. I've read this argument a number of times and personally I just don't buy it. How is Unicode any different from the IFAO font or the Gardiner font that Egyptologists have been using in publications for about one hundred years? They don't allow for variations either. If you want to see a text exactly as it was, you can't use anything published using those fonts, you will have to go back to originals, photographs, or facsimiles. No variation that isn't already lost in the use of fonts will be lost in the use of Unicode, but the use of Unicode will allow much more sophisticated manipulation and analysis of texts than is currently possible. As for Private Use Area, that is only a problem if everyone actually keeps it private. Why not set up an international database where everyone could contribute the private use area characters they have developed so that everyone could be on the same page in that regard? Admittedly, that would be easier if we had a real international Egyptological organization that actually had a strong role in our field doing something other than organizing a conference every 4 years...but that is our own fault too, not the fault of Unicode. Nicole B. Hansen, Ph.D. Egyptologist/E-learning developer ============================================================================== From: Patrick De Smet To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 20:03:08 +0200 Actually, there's no need to reinvent the wheel... Glyph for Windows uses scalable vector graphics, and the database is documented by the "Encoding Manual" (Manuel de codage)... Patrick De Smet udjat@skynet.be ============================================================================== From: "William Meriic" To: "'Ancient Egyptian Language List'" Subject: AEL SVG and Hieroglyphs Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 12:34:56 -0500 JSesh does just that. JSesh is an open-source Hiero text editor. The entry method is MdC, but the display is done with SVG. Anyone is welcome to contribute SVG glyphs (they only have a few thousand at the moment). The GOSP is working to create a few hundred that we feel are most important. http://jsesh.qenherkhopeshef.org/ The problem is that an average SVG glyph has quite a bit of data in it. By using a font, documents such as PDFs would be significantly smaller. For instance, an average JSesh sign is about 6,000 bytes, where as the same symbol in a Unicode document would require at most 3 bytes! That is a 99.9995% savings. Significant savings will also be found in RAM, and rendering time. One of the tricks that the GOSP generator uses to keep the output size of its PDFs down is to reduce the accuracy of the SVG. That helps some, but is nowhere near a font. Also, support for SVG in MS Office, most email clients, etc. are non-existent. Support in web browsers is mediocre at best. But, everyone supports true type! :-) Will ============================================================================== From: "William Meriic" To: "'Ancient Egyptian Language List'" Subject: RE: AEL Unicode and Hieroglyphs... Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 17:09:59 -0500 By the way, I just noticed that my casual use for terminology may have caused a little confusion. I just want to clarify something: The Unicode standard being developed for hieroglyphs (EGPZ: http://www.egpz.com/) defines a set of "characters". For example, one character is the hieroglyph A5 while another character is A5a. In common terminology A5a is often referred to as a variation of A5. But, each of these is a separate character under the standard. The standard currently includes thousands of these. Here is where things get a little confusing because of the overloading of meaning between two different fields of research. In font terminology the term glyph refers to a graphical representation (drawing) of a character and should not be confused with hieroglyph. So, the Projet Rosette is developing two fonts that implement the EGPZ standard. They both contain the same characters; but each font has its own glyphs (graphical representation of each character). One font mimics hieroglyphs as they are often painted while in other mimics hieroglyphs as they are carved (if I understand correctly). Now consider the example of the seated man A1. If you encounter a version of this hieroglyph with a crown (called A1a by the CCER) you would not find it in the standard as a unique character. So, you would either pursue a font whose glyph for A1 includes a crown, or you could make your own font with an appropriate glyph. While some one might refer to these as variations of each other, the font industry would refer to them as the same character; just different glyphs. As you can see these two industries use the same words for different purposes. I hope this clears up my description a little. What all of this allows for is a standard representation of text defined as characters; where the font dictates their representation. One font could be representative of how hieroglyphs were written on papyrus (cf. book of Ani) while another may be representative of how hieroglyphs were painted on wood. One could even develop a font that was representative of stylistic differences in, say, the Ptolemaic period. You get to choose the one the represents accurately what you are transcribing. Or you can even make one to guarantee 100% accuracy. Meanwhile, the underlying representation for the set of characters remains canonical facilitating processing and analysis. On a side note, from what I understand the EGPZ is being actively developed and as I mentioned there are already several fonts being developed including two from the Projet Rosette and one by InScribe. Will ============================================================================== Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 17:00:07 -0500 From: Robert Myers To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Bob Richmond of _InScribe_ appears to be the front runner in a Unicode scheme for hieroglyphs that would allow them to be displayed on web pages. There is information at his site about it. But, I think we have to face the fact that the graphic content of Egyptian inscriptions was put there for a reason by the scribes, and may suffer if too much simplification becomes accepted. Neurologists are discovering the advantages of wholesomely stimulating the right cerebral hemisphere, and the literate Egyptians seem to have grasped this, millennia ago. At the Edfu Projekt site is a processor called _Perfect Glyph_, which seems to me to lean in the opposite direction of a streamlined code, since Ptolemaic inscriptions often require the Extended List. ============================================================================== Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 17:27:41 -0500 From: Robert Myers To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Subject: Re: AEL SVG and Hieroglyphs Hi; In an off line response to a query of mine some time ago, one scholar pointed out that serious work on a text requires at least a good photograph, if physical access to the inscription is not possible. Perhaps the more a text has been studied and circulated, the more its significance can absorb the impact of a standardized presentation which may to some extent adulterate the original. Remember the Dead Sea Scrolls? They showed us how normative the editions of books accepted and disseminated by Rome became, compared with copies lovingly kept by Hebrew schools. Though such a thing may be politically advantageous, convenience doesn't always facilitate faithful study. For example, the two most complete copies of PtahHotep have many flaws, but each fills in gaps left by the other. I am doing my best to combine the advantages of both, but, I do not presume such a thing will be something useful to anyone but amateurs. I would not want tidiness to become a springboard for distortion. It will probably not be very soon that a web page will really need any better compression technology than now exists to present a standard representation of a well-studied text. The German site presenting P. Prisse gives us GIF images of the papyrus, as we follow the text along in a typeset presentation. It seems that a standard text is just one possible refinement of a fragile, flawed manuscript or monument. In Egypt, expedience was not a deity, as in the Industrial Age. I believe there may be great advantage in remembering that. Bob ============================================================================== From: "Peter Wakefield Sault" To: "Ancient Egyptian Language List" Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 21:40:49 +0100 If the desired result already exists then what is this entire thread about except re-inventing the wheel? As for re-inventing the wheel in general, I am a computer programmer whose 40-year career has largely comprised replacing other programmers' square wheels with round ones. Peter Wakefield Sault info@odeion.org http://ww.odeion.org ============================================================================== Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 21:40:20 +0200 From: Serge Rosmorduc To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Nicole B. Hansen a écrit : > >> Well, Unicode is certainly useful (and for transliteration, >> > it's an > >> absolute necessity), but it is really not suited for encoding >> > ancient > >> languages themselves, especially hieroglyphs. >> > > I've read this argument a number of times and personally I > just don't buy it. How is Unicode any different from the IFAO > font or the Gardiner font that Egyptologists have been using > in publications for about one hundred years? They don't allow > for variations either. If you want to see a text exactly as it > was, you can't use anything published using those fonts, you > will have to go back to originals, photographs, or facsimiles. > No variation that isn't already lost in the use of fonts will > be lost in the use of Unicode, but the use of Unicode will > allow much more sophisticated manipulation and analysis of > texts than is currently possible. > The difference is that when the IFAO needed a new sign they just made it. For almost all IFAO publications of Ptolemaic temples, new signs were created. Unicode involves heavyweight industry commitees, and they are slow to move, and rather reluctant to. As for the sophisticated analysis of texts, most of it *is* already possible. The difficult problem lies in the graphical variation of hieroglyphs and the variations of Egyptian orthography more than in the difference between encoding signs as "Gardiner codes" vs. encoding them as unicode code points. > As for Private Use Area, that is only a problem if everyone > actually keeps it private. Why not set up an international > database where everyone could contribute the private use area > characters they have developed so that everyone could be on > the same page in that regard? Admittedly, that would be easier > if we had a real international Egyptological organization that > actually had a strong role in our field doing something other > than organizing a conference every 4 years...but that is our > own fault too, not the fault of Unicode. > > Nicole B. Hansen, Ph.D. > Egyptologist/E-learning developer > Well, I agree on the need of such an internal commitee (in fact, I asked for it in Rhodes)... but first for Gardiner-like codes... I strongly believe we need a system to allow scholars to add their own glyphs ; that's why I decided to allow individual namespaces for glyphs in jsesh. I have spoken to ptolemaic scholars for instance, and they are rather vocal about their need to add new signs. Of course, when I deal with hieratic texts, I am mostly happy with the Gardiner set. Another problem with unicode is that the idea behind unicode is that you encode "characters" (i.e. meaningfull linguistic signs), and not "glyphs" (their graphical realization). Now, we do mostly encode glyphs, or at least families thereof. That's because unicode was made for producing document (for instance, if your text processor is smart enough, it will ligaturate f and i. We don't want our hieroglyphic texts processors to tell us how the text is laid out ; we want a reasonable reproduction of the original.. My feeling about texts encoding (at least hieroglyphic texts), is that we would in theory need two level of analysis. The first would be mostly graphical (leadings to searches like "how is this particular variant of A1 placed on the walls of my temple", and the second would be more linguistic. I'm probably a bit vocal about this. The reasons are the following. First, I have the impression (perhaps false), that the secondary point of the inclusion of hieroglyphs in unicode has played a part in the delay of the inclusion of the characters needed to transliterate hieroglyphs in unicode. And, for these, I will say that a unicode representation is badly needed, but alas we still miss the yod. The second point is that I believe that the encoding of hieroglyphs is too important to worry about the politics and timeframes of unicode. Of course we would be able to use private zones for this too, but in this case we would need some rather reactive commitee (and liberal, too. If a scholar wants to encode a slight variant of a signs, it's his decision), and, mostly, we should not worry about the problem of whether or not the result will be accepted into "standard" unicode. Best regards, Serge ============================================================================== Date: Fri, 20 Jun 2008 10:11:45 -0500 From: Robert Myers To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Subject: Re: AEL Unicode and Hieroglyphs... William Meriic wrote: > So, the Projet Rosette is developing two fonts that implement the EGPZ > standard. They both contain the same characters; but each font has its own > glyphs (graphical representation of each character). One font mimics > hieroglyphs as they are often painted while in other mimics hieroglyphs as > they are carved (if I understand correctly). > > > What all of this allows for is a standard representation of text defined as > characters; where the font dictates their representation. One font could be > representative of how hieroglyphs were written on papyrus (cf. book of Ani) > while another may be representative of how hieroglyphs were painted on wood. > One could even develop a font that was representative of stylistic > differences in, say, the Ptolemaic period. Hi; If anyone has details on the progress of a character set for what Fischer called "semicursive" or non-ligatured hieroglyphic book script, please share this. I have been contemplating and laboring on such a set with very slow progress. The problem is that, to do justice to any calligraphic font with a thousand or so characters, it takes a lot more time than I have been able to devote, as suitably good form would require not only impeccable graphic sense, but daily practice for years to develop the supporting dexterity. The value of such a font would not be in the area of precision or philology but could be (as Mr. Richmond remarked) "decorative and didactic". I for one would very much like to have the option of printing out Egyptian texts in a font that actually resembles what one encounters in the classic (e.g. NK funerary) papyri. Thanks. Bob ============================================================================== From: Carl Edlund Anderson Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Date: Fri, 20 Jun 2008 07:44:28 -0500 To: Ancient Egyptian Language List On 19 Jun 2008, at 17:00 , Robert Myers wrote: > But, I think we have to face the fact that the graphic content of > Egyptian inscriptions was put there for a reason by the scribes, > and may suffer if too much simplification becomes accepted. This is surely true, though it is probably to some extent true for all texts. But what the kind of a scholar or student needs for a particular task or type of task is an important issue in the applicability of Unicode encoded characters. My original academic background is in medieval Scandinavian studies, and not even all the Latin-based characters one would need to produce a regular diplomatic edition of many manuscripts are yet available or standardized in Unicode (not to mention many characters for runic texts). And even a diplomatic edition would lose certain kinds of information that only a facsimile could reasonably convey, and then there are still issues which can only be addressed by examining the original manuscript or inscription itself. But -- then again -- not every scholar or student is working on an issue that requires access to the original, a facsimile, or even a diplomatic edition. Many -- and doubtless the majority -- are working on topics where even the ability to access the current range of standard characters available for their studies, to be able to enter them in a standardized way and of course to be able to _search_ across the internet for strings of those characters and be able to find them on web sites or PDF articles scattered hither, thither and yon is a great benefit. Doubtless there are issues to be addressed in working out hieroglyphic encodings that surpass those of any merely alphabetic writing system, and no doubt the Unicode consortium is slow and filled with tedious politicking, but I can't help but think that it would be nice if the the same advantages I described above could be enjoyed by Egyptologists. Should an Egyptologist not be able to type a string of hieroglyphs into their Web browser and find some papers or notes recently produced by other Egyptologists that include that same string? Cheers, Carl -- Carl Edlund Anderson http://www.carlaz.com/ ============================================================================== Date: Sat, 21 Jun 2008 16:01:23 -0500 From: Robert Myers To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Subject: Re: AEL The GlyphStudy Open-Source Projects Group announces its grand opening Carl Edlund Anderson wrote: > Doubtless there are issues to be addressed in working out hieroglyphic > encodings that surpass those of any merely alphabetic writing system, > and no doubt the Unicode consortium is slow and filled with tedious > politicking, but I can't help but think that it would be nice if the > the same advantages I described above could be enjoyed by > Egyptologists. Should an Egyptologist not be able to type a string of > hieroglyphs into their Web browser and find some papers or notes > recently produced by other Egyptologists that include that same string? Hi; Yes! What we could consider in the interim is that a web presentation of an hieroglyphic text can be done with images of glyph lines, accompanied by transliteration. When I search the net for an inscription, I use the alphabetic MdC of the transliteration, and good information often surfaces. The power to search documents for AE texts in Unicode would be a miraculous new advantage for students and professionals. I believe that the experts in Egyptology and Computer Science who have been laboring on this problem have been doing so with laudable diligence. Should anyone feel that this capability should be further expedited, perahps become well informed on progress, to date? I think said researchers deserve the utmost encouragement. Most of us have seen how, in academic situations, it is best when creative concerns receive priority over parliamentary ones, whenever possible (unless there is a professional emergency). Bob ==============================================================================