An Overview is an overview of aspects of the writing systems of a large family of languages that are collectively called complex-text languages, including bidirectional languages. If you are familiar with complex-text languages and the problems associated with their processing and presentation, you need not read this chapter. Implementation Example is an implementation example. This document is intended for system and application programmers who want to provide support for complex-text languages. Italic strings are used for emphasis or to identify the first instance of a word requiring definition.
Normal font is used for the names of constants and literals.
Syntax, code examples and user input in interactive examples are shown in fixed width font. Variables within syntax statements are shown in italic fixed width font . Shading is used as described in Approach . This document could not have been prepared without the considerable contribution of many. The functions defined for Complex-text Language Layout transformations can be seen as the product of the effort of the architects and developers of the traditional Bidirectional support and the emerging Unicode focus on directionality.