RE: [OT] multilingual support in MS products (was Re: Kurdish ghayn)

On 26/04/2003 01:54:03 "Chris Pratley" wrote:

>Bob, you might also check to see if Tools/Options/Complex Scripts/Use
>sequence checking makes a difference. Also I would make sure you try
>with a complex script language enabled just in case that has an effect.
>
>I can't repro the problem by the way. I type "g" followed by 0323, then
>Alt-x. The dot appears, but with most fonts since they do not have the
>OT tables  the dot appears nearly or entirely on top of the descender of
>the "g" so it may appear invisible.

I thought I should follow-up for the benefit of the list...

1) Typing 0323 followed by Alt-X is not the same as having U+0323 generated
by a keyboard layout. Chris is right that using Alt-X doesn't reproduce the
behavior.

2) If you have a keyboard that generates U+0323 (or any of a number of
other combining marks) directly, you will find that (by default) Word does
not allow the combining marks to be entered after anything other than a, e,
i, o, u, or y.

3) Chris identified this workaroud: First you need to enable Thai language
support (Office Language Settings applet). Then in Tools / Options /
Complex Scripts you turn off the "Use sequence checking" feature.

Now I can happily put dots under any character I wish :-)    (Of course
correctly positioning the dot requires cooperation from the font.)

4) Note of caution: At this point you can turn off the Thai language
support, which means the "Use sequence checking" option is removed from the
Tools / Options / Complex Scripts dialog. HOWEVER, the setting itself
sticks to whatever it was left as -- so I can continue to put dots under my
"g"s if I want to.

(Thanks, Chris, for providing the info!)

Bob