Path: csiph.com!usenet.pasdenom.info!weretis.net!feeder4.news.weretis.net!newsreader4.netcologne.de!news.netcologne.de!xlned.com!feeder1.xlned.com!news.astraweb.com!border2.a.newsrouter.astraweb.com!news.tele.dk!news.tele.dk!small.news.tele.dk!newsgate.cistron.nl!newsgate.news.xs4all.nl!post.news.xs4all.nl!not-for-mail Return-Path: X-Original-To: python-list@python.org Delivered-To: python-list@mail.python.org X-Spam-Status: OK 0.021 X-Spam-Evidence: '*H*': 0.96; '*S*': 0.00; 'subject:Python': 0.06; 'problem:': 0.07; 'subject: -- ': 0.07; 'alternatives': 0.09; 'broke': 0.09; 'received:80.91': 0.09; 'received:80.91.229': 0.09; 'received:gmane.org': 0.09; 'received:list': 0.09; 'url:blog': 0.10; "wouldn't": 0.14; '*less*': 0.16; 'received:80.91.229.3': 0.16; 'received:plane.gmane.org': 0.16; 'spacing': 0.16; 'subject:Unicode': 0.16; 'subject:handling': 0.16; 'variants': 0.16; 'fix': 0.17; 'wrote:': 0.18; 'issue.': 0.22; 'separate': 0.22; 'header:User-Agent:1': 0.23; 'alternate': 0.24; 'merge': 0.24; 'received:comcast.net': 0.24; 'specify': 0.24; 'unicode': 0.24; 'connected': 0.24; 'looks': 0.24; 'specially': 0.26; 'second': 0.26; 'header:X-Complaints-To:1': 0.27; 'header:In- Reply-To:1': 0.27; 'appear': 0.29; 'character': 0.29; "doesn't": 0.30; 'characters': 0.30; 'mix': 0.30; 'especially': 0.30; 'origin': 0.31; 'piece': 0.31; 'text': 0.33; "can't": 0.35; 'display': 0.35; 'created': 0.35; 'but': 0.35; 'there': 0.35; 'done': 0.36; 'too': 0.37; 'to:addr:python-list': 0.38; 'pm,': 0.38; 'url:2012': 0.39; 'to:addr:python.org': 0.39; 'received:org': 0.40; 'space': 0.40; 'how': 0.40; 'even': 0.60; 'letters': 0.60; 'matter': 0.61; 'simply': 0.61; 'email addr:gmail.com': 0.63; 'more': 0.64; 'great': 0.65; 'close': 0.67; 'sound': 0.68; 'url:11': 0.68; 'to,': 0.72; 'url:info': 0.73; 'funny': 0.74; 'day': 0.76; 'article': 0.77; '"simply': 0.84; 'demonstrates': 0.84; 'faces,': 0.84; 'fl,': 0.84; 'near,': 0.84; 'overlap.': 0.84; 'together,': 0.84 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ To: python-list@python.org From: Ned Batchelder Subject: Re: Python Unicode handling wins again -- mostly Date: Sat, 30 Nov 2013 18:07:36 -0500 References: <529934dc$0$29993$c3e8da3$5496439d@news.astraweb.com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: c-50-133-228-126.hsd1.ma.comcast.net User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.8; rv:24.0) Gecko/20100101 Thunderbird/24.1.1 In-Reply-To: X-BeenThere: python-list@python.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.15 Precedence: list List-Id: General discussion list for the Python programming language List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Newsgroups: comp.lang.python Message-ID: Lines: 50 NNTP-Posting-Host: 2001:888:2000:d::a6 X-Trace: 1385852868 news.xs4all.nl 15979 [2001:888:2000:d::a6]:51229 X-Complaints-To: abuse@xs4all.nl Xref: csiph.com comp.lang.python:60812 On 11/30/13 5:37 PM, Gregory Ewing wrote: > wxjmfauth@gmail.com wrote: >> And do you know the origin of this typographical feature? >> Because, mechanically, the dot of the "i" broke too often. >> >> In my opinion, a very plausible explanation. > > It doesn't sound very plausible to me, because there > are a lot more stand-alone 'i's in English text than > there are ones following an f. What is there to stop > them from breaking? > > It's more likely to be simply a kerning issue. You > want to get the stems of the f and the i close together, > and the only practical way to do that with mechanical > type is to merge them into one piece of metal. > > Which makes it even sillier to have an 'ffi' character > in this day and age, when you can simply space the > characters so that they overlap. > The fi ligature was created because visually, an f and i wouldn't work well together: the crossbar of the f was near, but not connected to the serif of the i, and the terminal bulb of the f was close to, but not coincident, with the dot of the i. This article goes into great detail, and has a good illustration of how an f and i can clash, and how an fi ligature can fix the problem: http://opentype.info/blog/2012/11/20/whats-a-ligature/ . Note the second fi illustration, which demonstrates using a ligature to make the letters appear *less* connected than they would individually! This is also why "simply spacing the characters" isn't a solution: a specially designed ligature looks better than a separate f and i, no matter how minutely kerned. It's unfortunate that Unicode includes presentation alternatives like the fi (and ff, fl, ffi, and fl) ligatures. It was done to be a superset of existing encodings. Many typefaces have other non-encoded ligatures as well, especially display faces, which also have alternate glyphs. Unicode is a funny mix in that it includes some forms of alternates, but can't include all of them, so we have to put up with both an ad-hoc Unicode that includes presentational variants, and also some other way to specify variants because Unicode can't include all of them. --Ned.