From: lunde@adobe.com (Ken Lunde)
Newsgroups: sci.lang.japan
Subject: Questionnaire on Kana font sets
Date: 6 Oct 92 20:57:10 GMT
Organization: Adobe Systems Incorporated

Hello!

	My name is Ken R. Lunde, and I work at Adobe Systems Incorporated in
the area of Japanese Font Production. I would like to ask readers of this
mailing list or newsgroup several questions about how we should implement
our kana-only character sets. Please respond to me, not to this discussion
group. I can be reached by email at "lunde@mv.us.adobe.com"; by FAX at
(415)960-0886; or by mail at

Ken R. Lunde
Adobe Systems Incorporated
1585 Charleston Road
P.O. Box 7900
Mountain View, CA 94039-7900
USA

Please use whichever means is best for you.
	First, to give you all a little background on our current ideas. We
think we know all the various options for implementing a kana-only
character set, but we need users like you to let us know which way is
potentially the most useful to end-users of such a product. Each method
has pros and cons. For example, if kana-only fonts were made as single-
byte encoded, these would behave as Roman fonts, namely that they would
not require a Japanese OS environment, and would be able to use
proportional metrics (at least on a Macintosh). However, the user would
need to use a keycap chart to input these kana characters. On the other
hand, as two-byte encoded fonts, they would be monospaced as any other
Japanese fonts is (at least on the Macintosh), but would then share
the same encoding so that changing fonts between Japanese (kana and
kanji) and kana would not require reinputting characters.
	I am basically looking for answers to two questions: 1) Should we
encode these characters with two bytes like they should, or go with
one-byte encoding? and 2) What characters should be in a kana-only
character set?
	Now for the real questions:

1) What special hiragana characters, if any, should be added to such a
   character set (i.e., those above and beyond those specified in JIS
   X 0208-1990)?

   LIST THEM (make a minimal and maximum set, if possible)

2) What special Katakana characters, if any, should be added to such a
   character set (i.e., those above and beyond those specified in JIS
   X 0208-1990)?

   LIST THEM (make a minimal and maximum set, if possible)

3) What other symbols should be part of a Kana-only character set? Think
   in terms of being able to compose documents in Japanese without using
   any kanji. Also, think in terms of half- versus full-width character,
   and also vertically versus horizontally set.

   LIST THEM (make a minimal and maximum set, if possible)

4) Should half-width katakana be included in this character set?

   (a) YES
   (b) NO

5) Should half-width hiragana be included in this character set?

   (a) YES
   (b) NO

6) Should the Kana-only character sets share the same double-byte encoding
   like the Kana in PostScript Japanese fonts?

   (a) NO (EXPLAIN)
   (b) YES
   (c) MAKE BOTH ONE- AND TWO-BYTE ENCODED VERSIONS SO THE USER CAN DECIDE
       WHICH TO USE

7) If you answered (a) or (c) to question #6, should hiragana and katakana be
   in separate fonts?

   (a) YES
   (b) NO (EXPLAIN)

8) If it were possible to substitute the kana in existing PostScript Japanese
   fonts (i.e., fonts on a printer hard drive and on a CPU running ATM-J) with
   kana-only character sets by the end user, would this be useful to you? This
   would not wipe out existing fonts, but just add fonts. Note that changing
   the kana in a Japanese document can significantly change the *look* and
   *feel* of the document as most Japanese documents are comprised of about
   70% kana.

   (a) NO
   (b) A TINY BIT
   (c) YES
   (d) EXTREMELY