Re: Russian letters

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Paul Pogonyshev <address@hidden>
> Date: Fri, 7 Jul 2006 22:59:40 +0300
> 
> >     utf-fragment-on-decoding's value is nil
> > 
> >     Whether or not to decode some chars in UTF-8/16 text into iso8859 
> > charsets.
> >     [...]
> 
> Why not do the same to the typed characters?

Maybe it does, let's find out: how did you type those characters?  Did
you use a Leim input method (which one?), or did you type them on your
keyboard?

> Current behavior is inconsistent---some characters are decoded (into
> iso-8859 charsets), some are not.

I think it is consistent in the default configuration.

> > The reason why the default value is nil is precisely that most users
> > will not want the fragmentation, they will want the characters to
> > belong to a single character set.
> 
> I understand you, but actually, most users do not bother.  Emacs should
> work `out of the box' and display the characters.

It does work `out of the box', if you don't change the value of
utf-fragment-on-decoding.

> Why doesn't Emacs try to decode characters on displaying?

Decoding happens on input, when the characters are inserted into a
buffer, not when they are displayed.  Such insertion occurs when you
either (a) type the characters at the keyboard, or (b) visit a file,
or (c) paste them from an X selection or a clipboard, or (d) read
output of some process which interacts with Emacs.  (I hope I didn't
forget any other possibilities.)

If you describe how you typed those characters, maybe we will find a
bug that needs to be fixed.

> > Did you set this variable to a non-nil value in your .emacs?  If so,
> > how about removing that customization?  If the reason is that you
> > don't have Unicode fonts installed, I think installing them is a
> > better solution.
> 
> I use Debian Sarge which is only 1 year old.  And Emacs doesn't work
> with its standard font and Cyrillic letters as is.  (Well, I didn't
> try the standard package, but CVS `emacs -Q' shows boxes.)  I had enough
> persistence to find the reason (here, thank you), but most users won't.
> Especially since Emacs cannot even list font families (at least I don't
> know how.)

I still don't understand whether you modified the value of
utf-fragment-on-decoding or it came that way with Debian Sarge.  In
the latter case, I think it's something to complain about to Debian
maintainers.

The missing fonts is also an issue with Debian, I think.  Perhaps they
have an optional package you need to install, but since you live in a
Cyrillic locale (if I understand correctly the headers of your
message), I find it hard to believe that your system lacks Unicode
fonts that don't support Cyrillic characters.

If you do have these fonts installed, maybe it's yet another bug in
Emacs.  One of your prior messages showed that your locale is
en_US.utf8.  I don't know enough about font selection and fontsets;
Handa-san, could you please tell Paul what information to send in
order to find out why Unicode fonts aren't found by Emacs?