Re: [Devel] GB18030 problem

[Anthony Fok]

On Mon, Nov 05, 2001 at 12:23:03PM +1000, Leon Ho wrote:
> On Fri, 2 Nov 2001, Mike A. Harris wrote:
> > On Fri, 2 Nov 2001, Werner LEMBERG wrote:
> > >> We are implementing a new charset, zh_CN.GB18030, into several
> > >> applications (like XFree86, qt, input method).
> > >Hopefully, your results willl be freely available.  What about a free
> > >GB 18030 (supplementary) font?
> > Red Hat developed software is open source, including patches, so 
> > this work, like all development will be sent upstream under 
> > compatible license.
> > Currently, we do not develop fonts however.  Perhaps the new Luxi 
> > fonts contributed to XFree86 are useable?  Not sure..

Hello!

Wow, it is nice to know that everyone is working hard to support GB18030. 
:-)  XteamLinux and Turbolinux have zh_CN.GB18030 products on the market
already, and Turbolinux 7.0 (Chinese) is the first Linux product to pass
the test in China.  We are now all playing catch-up.  :-)

Fortunately, the mastermind behind GB18030 support in Turbolinux is James Su
<address@hidden> who have already contributed much code back to the
community (and much are available on the CVS server at Turbolinux JP). He
has also been very helpful too.  :-)  Of course, we at ThizLinux Laboratory
Ltd. are also working toward the same goal.  :-)

To avoid duplication of work, and as you may already know, James Su has
already gotten patches for various applications.  For Qt-2.3.x series, both
James and I (and Leon Zhang from XteamLinux) have contributed codes to Qt,
but unfortunately the bulk of Big5-HKSCS and GB18030 couldn't make it into
2.3.2 because we were a bit late.  :-)  Anyhow, these patches will be
further optimized and fixed and hopefully make it into Qt-2.3.3 and Qt-3.x
series.

If you are interested, perhaps we could compare notes and share some patches
and help debug our GB18030 support.  :-)

> Indeed. All the patches we created or applied will be available from our 
> src.rpms and will be sent the upstream if possible.
> 
> > >> If only we display 0x8139EE39, 0x8139EF30, there are no problem.
> > >> However if we include 0x8139EE38, all the glyphs in the application
> > >> will be erased with blanks.
> > >
> > >Strange indeed.  Maybe a bug in the (3,10) charmap support of
> > >FreeType?  Since I don't have such a font, I can't analyze it further.
> > >What about other fonts with a (3,10) charmap?  E.g. the code2001 font
> > >(is this the right name?) from James Kass?
> > 
> > I'll let Leon take that one.  ;o)
> 
> Are you refering the font from 
> http://home.att.net/~jameskass/code2001.htm?
> 
> It may be the same bug, as GB18030 and Unicode have simliar planes and we 
> are using -iso10646-1 as the charset for the font.
> 
> There is a publicly available ttf for GB18030 in the community. It's at 
> ftp://ftp.turbolinux.co.jp/pub/TurboLinux/stable/tested/current/i586/ttf-zh-song-1.4-6.noarch.rpm

But of course, if my understanding is correct, this font is not free
(neither zero-cost nor libre).  It is marvellous that this font is available
for us to test our software, but just a reminder to all: don't re-distribute
it, and don't sell it unless permission is obtained from the original font
vendor.

Cheers,

Anthony

-- 
Anthony Fok Tung-Ling  ÀNªFÆF
ThizLinux Laboratory   <address@hidden> http://www.thizlinux.com/
Debian Chinese Project <address@hidden>       http://www.debian.org/intl/zh/
Come visit Our Lady of Victory Camp!           http://www.olvc.ab.ca/