From: jpl@lyra.Stanford.EDU (Jonathan Lavigne)
Subject: Re: Whither Unicode?
Keywords: Unicode international character encoding standard
Organization: DSG, Stanford University
Date: 10 Apr 92 22:41:38 GMT

irving@eskimo.celestial.com (Larry Gilbert) writes:

>The other day, I purchased a book entitled _The Unicode Standard: Worldwide
>Character Encoding_ (Version 1.0, Volume 1) by The Unicode Consortium,
>published by Addison-Wesley (ISBN 0-201-56788-1).  I was happy to find it,
>mostly because it does a thorough job of following through with an idea similar
>to one I've had for a while.

>For those unfamiliar with Unicode, it is a standard (not yet officially
>recognized) which attempts to unify most major world character encoding 
>standards into one standard which uses 16-bit character codes.

[Original statement of questions omitted]

[24788] FRI 04/10/92 15:22 FROM BR.JMA "Joan Aliprand": The Unicode Standard;
Larry Gilbert asks several questions about Unicode:

1.  Where is Unicode now?  Is it being used, or indeed is there support for it?

2.  "The Unicode Standard" seems to indicate that Unicode would be incorporated
    into the framework of a larger 32-bit international character set ("ISO DIS
    10646"); does anyone know the status of this ISO standard?

3. Meta-question:  Is this an appropriate newsgroup for discussing this?

Answer to Question 1:
The Unicode standard is very much alive.  Vol. 2 of the "The Unicode Standard,"
which covers East Asian ("Han") ideographic characters is being readied for
publication.

The corporations that belong to the Unicode Consortium show their support for
the Unicode standard in three ways:  they pay dues for membership in the
Consortium; their employees participate in various activities (primarily the
Unicode Technical Committee); they host workshops on implementing the Unicode
standard.  And (of course) some of the corporations that belong to the Unicode
Consortium are incorporating Unicode into future products.

The list of acknowledgements in "The Unicode Standard" identifies the companies
and individuals who contributed to its development.  The July 1991 issue of BYTE
includes an article ("ASCII Goes Global" by Kenneth M. Sheldon) that gives an
overview of the Unicode standard and a little about its history.

Answer to Question 2:
Unicode's character repertoire and encoding have been incorporated into the
latest draft of ISO's Universal Character Set (DIS 10646-1.2).  The DIS is
currently being balloted; the closing date is 5/30/92.

The U.S. position on DIS 10646 is the responsibility of ANSI Subcommittee X3L2.

Comment on Question 3:
You can be added to the Unicode mailing list by sending a note with your e-mail
address to unicode-request@sun.com.  This is the best arena for discussing
Unicode-related topics.

Author's background:
You'll find my name in the list of acknowledgements in "The Unicode Standard."
My employer, The Research Libraries Group, Inc., is a member of the Unicode
Consortium.

-- Joan Aliprand

P.S.

The following press release from Microsoft mentions that the Japanes
version of Windows 3.1 supports Unicode (here spelled "Uni-code").

>  ---------------------------- Text of forwarded message ---------------------
>
>
> TOKYO, JAPAN, 1992 MAR 16 (NB) -- The Japanese office of Microsoft
> will release a Japanese version of Windows 3.1 this summer. This
> will be an upgrade to Windows 3.0.
>
> Microsoft Windows 3.1 has a 32-bit application interface, and is
> compatible with Windows NT. This program also supports
> Truetype outline fonts, the same system supported on Apple's
> Macintosh. Also, Windows 3.1 supports multimedia features and
> object-oriented technology. Microsoft says Windows 3.1 will be
> easier to use in the rewriting of English programs into Japanese
> because all the programs are written in a 2-byte code called
> "Uni-code."
>
> About 200,000 units of Windows 3.0 were shipped in Japan since it
> was released in February 1991. More than 100 kinds of applications
> have been developed for Windows 3.0.
>
> (Masayuki Miyazawa/19920316/Press Contact: Microsoft Tokyo office,
>  +81-3-3363-3419)