From: esz001@cck.coventry.ac.uk (Will Overington)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.esperanto
Subject: Expressing Esperanto text on computer systems 2.
Keywords: Esperanto accents, computer systems.
Date: 14 Apr 92 11:24:15 GMT
Followup-To: soc.culture.esperanto
Organization: Coventry Polytechnic, Coventry, UK



14th April 1992

A new method for expressing Esperanto text on computer systems.
An extension of the system.

W. J. G. Overington

Department of Electrical, Electronic and Systems Engineering,
Coventry Polytechnic,
Priory Street,
Coventry CV1 5FB
England.

In the previous paper I outlined a new method for expressing
Esperanto text on computer systems.

The technique is that an accented Esperanto character is signaled
in one of several ways, depending upon the situation.

If the accented character is either the first or second letter of
a sentence, the presence of the accent is indicated by entering
the first letter of the sentence as lowercase.  The steloj
software then changes the first letter of the sentence to become
uppercase and accents the first letter that could carry an
Esperanto accent, whether it is the first or second letter of the
word.  This decision is based solely upon whether the letter is
any one of C, c, G, g, H, h, J, j, S, s, U, u.

If the accented character is either the first or second letter of
any word in a sentence other than the first word, the presence of
the accent is indicated by an underscore character immediately
preceding the word, even if there is an end of line between the
underscore character and the word.  In display, the underscore
character is shown as a space.

All other accented letters are indicated by the case of the
letter being the opposite of the case of the second letter of the
word.  The steloj software changes the case to be the same as the
case of the second letter of the word, and accents the character.

In devising the system I have realized that the method depends
upon there not occurring any two letter permutations at the start
of any actual Esperanto word that could not be handled by the
system.

The system is capable of signaling 72 different start of word
permutations that involve two letters each of which is either an
accented character, or one of the letters that could carry an
accent but that does not in this case.  I am not here counting
the differences between uppercase and lowercase.  The figure of
72 is counted by considering space or underscore as two
possibilities; c, g, h, j, s, u as six possibilities for the
first letter and c, g, h, j, s, u as six possibilities for the
second letter.  Two times six times six is 72.

Thus 72 is the number of computationally available permutations.

The number of typographically available permutations is 144.
This is because there are twelve possibilities for the first
letter and twelve possibilities for the second letter, namely c,
c circumflex, g, g circumflex, h, h circumflex, j, j circumflex,
s, s circumflex, u, u breve for each character position.

Thus the number of computationally available permutations is much
less than the number of typographically available permutations.

However, the number of what I here call the Esperanto available
permutations is different again, and not necessarily a number
that is fixed in time.  Some permutations, such as c circumflex
followed by u are common, and others, such as g circumflex
followed by j circumflex may well be impossible.

However, there exists a case, for which I have not been able, at
least in the dictionary that I have (The Teach Yourself Esperanto
- English Dictionary, purchased in the early 1970s), to find any
example, but which I feel that I should cover, in case it already
occurs in some word, or could in the future.  This case is that
of a word starting with a u followed by an accented character,
which in the system thus far described could not be signaled to
the computer system, as the u would be regarded as the first
available character capable of being accented and thus would be
accented, with the following character, which should be accented,
left unaccented.

I have therefore decided to include in the system provision to
cover this case.  This is achieved by allowing an additional
accentable character, namely a y, which is a letter not used in
Esperanto.  An accented y is defined as displaying an unaccented
u, but not counting this as having satisfied the requirement that
the first available character that could be accented is accented.
Uppercase accented Y and lowercase accented y are both defined.

I have tried to find a word that would demonstrate this situation
and, not having found such a word, I have decided to seek to coin
one.  I am aware that there is a possibility that there exists a
proper procedure for applying to register such a word but I am
unaware as to how to proceed.  I will happily comply with the
official process if I can find out the rules.

I suggest that a word, a noun root, be introduced consisting of a
u followed by a c circumflex.  In the steloj system of expressing
Esperanto characters in computer systems this would be _yc.  In
the existing widely used net discussion method, it would be uc^.
In the context of seeking to contribute to Esperanto culture, I
have decided to define this noun as a software unicorn, being a
mythical animal representing the special provision in a piece of
software for a situation that conceivably could exist but which
may never in practice exist at all.  I devised the concept of a
software unicorn this morning, influenced by the u and the
possibly mythical nature of the situation for which I was
designing a special provision.  I envisage a software unicorn as
being depicted heraldically as a white unicorn standing facing
left with a golden horn and golden hooves, sparsely powdered with
green stars.  I envisage that several of these mythical animals
could be depicted artistically in a large oil painting about 4
feet high and 6 feet wide, entitled

Uc^ino kaj du uc^idoj

which in the steloj system would be entered as

ycino kaj du_ycidoj

and as a decorated porcelain sculpture.

Thus the provision of the accented y feature may, in fact, be but
a software unicorn at the present time, but is provided so that
the normal progression of word coining will not produce a
situation that cannot be represented in the steloj system.

Copyright (c) 1992 W. J. G. Overington at Coventry Polytechnic.
Published in the usenet newsgroup soc.culture.esperanto.
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