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Subject: FW: Proposal - dir attribute
-----Original Message----- From: Richard Ishida [mailto:ishida@w3.org] Sent: Monday, April 03, 2006 4:35 PM To: gershon@tech-tav.com; dita-translation@lists.oasis-open.org; mambrose@sdl.com; pcarey@lexmark.com; rfletcher@sdl.com; bhertz@sdl.com; tony.jewtushenko@productinnovator.com; 'Lieske, Christian'; 'Jennifer Linton'; 'Munshi, Sukumar'; 'Charles Pau'; dpooley@sdl.com; 'Reynolds, Peter'; 'Felix Sasaki'; 'Yves Savourel'; 'Dave A Schell'; 'Bryan Schnabel' Cc: 'Richard Ishida' Subject: RE: Proposal - dir attribute Hi Gershon, [Please forward to lists] > * Assume a direction of LTR unless otherwise specified, regardless of > the xml:lang. I believe this is the correct approach. Note that this is also the approach used for HTML/XHTML, so users should be used to that. This will also maintain interoperability for legacy documents. There should, of course, be no penalty for actually using dir="ltr" on the document root element if you want to. > This means that on an Arabic or > Hebrew document, the author will have to explicitly set dir on the > root element of every document. Users generally expect setting the > language gives them the correct directionality for the language. Given the prevalence of X/HTML, I don't think this will cause real difficulties. > Perhaps tools could handle this > automatically for the user. I suppose it would certainly be possible, though I think they should propose to the user what to do rather than silently change the code. Best regards, RI ============ Richard Ishida Internationalization Lead W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) http://www.w3.org/People/Ishida/ http://www.w3.org/International/ http://people.w3.org/rishida/blog/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/ishida/ > -----Original Message----- > From: Gershon L Joseph [mailto:gershon@tech-tav.com] > Sent: 31 March 2006 10:56 > To: dita-translation@lists.oasis-open.org; mambrose@sdl.com; > pcarey@lexmark.com; rfletcher@sdl.com; bhertz@sdl.com; 'Richard > Ishida'; tony.jewtushenko@productinnovator.com; > 'Lieske, Christian'; 'Jennifer Linton'; 'Munshi, Sukumar'; 'Charles > Pau'; dpooley@sdl.com; 'Reynolds, Peter'; 'Felix Sasaki'; 'Yves > Savourel'; 'Dave A Schell'; 'Bryan Schnabel' > Subject: RE: Proposal - dir attribute > > Hi Richard, > > Thanks for this feedback. Essentially you're saying directionality is > independent of the language. I was trying to reduce the work of > authors/translators by inferring an initial direction from the > xml:lang attribute. If we remove the initial directionality defaulting > based on language, we have two choices: > > * Assume a direction of LTR unless otherwise specified, regardless of > the xml:lang. This means that on an Arabic or Hebrew document, the > author will have to explicitly set dir on the root element of every > document. Users generally expect setting the language gives them the > correct directionality for the language. Perhaps tools could handle > this automatically for the user. > > * Require the user to set dir on the root element, and have it > optional everywhere else. > > I think we should adopt the same approach as we did for xml:lang, in > that the attribute is optional, but best practice recommends using it > on the root element of each document. > > Treating directionality independently from language definitely > simplifies the algorithm, and probably makes it easier for users to > understand too. > > Does everyone agree that we should separate directionality from > language? > > Any other comments? > > > Best Regards, > Gershon > > -----Original Message----- > From: Richard Ishida [mailto:ishida@w3.org] > Sent: Monday, March 27, 2006 2:45 PM > To: gershon@tech-tav.com; dita-translation@lists.oasis-open.org; > mambrose@sdl.com; pcarey@lexmark.com; rfletcher@sdl.com; > bhertz@sdl.com; tony.jewtushenko@productinnovator.com; > 'Lieske, Christian'; 'Jennifer Linton'; 'Munshi, Sukumar'; 'Charles > Pau'; dpooley@sdl.com; 'Reynolds, Peter'; 'Felix Sasaki'; 'Yves > Savourel'; 'Dave A Schell'; 'Bryan Schnabel' > Cc: 'Richard Ishida' > Subject: RE: Proposal - dir attribute > > Hello Gershon, > > [Please forward this email to lists I am unable to reach.] > > I have the following comments on the proposal: > > [1] > === > "1. xml:lang attribute on the document element or, if not specified, > default language assumed by the processor. > Directionality is determined by the Unicode bidirectional algorithm > for this language. > > "2. xml:lang attribute on any element that overrides the inherited > language. Again, directionality is determined by the Unicode > bidirectional algorithm for the specified language." > > xml:lang should be used to declare language only, and not > directionality, > because: > > (a) It does *not* give information about directionality. > Direction cannot be inferred from that information. For example, > Azerbaijani is written LTR in Azerbaijan (Latin > script) but RTL in Iran (Arabic script) - yet it is still > xml:lang="az" in both cases. The same applies for non-standard > orthographies (for example an IPA transcription of Hebrew in W3C's > Speech Synthesis Markup Language should be labelled xml:lang="he", but > *not* dir="rtl"). > > (b) dir could be used inline within the same paragraph with values of > ltr in one place and rtl in another. xml:lang is not designed for this > type of use, and so dir is needed anyway - why complicate matters by > having two ways to designate directionality, one of which is incapable > of actually doing most of the job? Better reduce confusion and scope > for error by having simple, clear semantics to the attributes. > > (c) The Unicode bidi algorithm works on the basis of the Unicode > character semantics as modified by directional embedding directives > (ie. dir), not the language expressed in xml:lang, so 'the Unicode > bidirectional algorithm for this language' doesn't make sense. > > (d) In a document that is generally in English you may have a small > table that contains only Hebrew or Arabic text. > Although it would make sense to use xml:lang on the table markup, so > that you don't have to repeat it, you would probably *not* want the > table columns to flow from right to left (as would usually be the case > when using dir="rtl" on the table), since this is an English document. > If xml:lang was associated with direction, you would probably have no > control over that. Same goes for list items. > > (e) Note that, once you have established the general directionality of > the document, you *don't* have to specify dir for every instance of > RTL text. > If I wanted to display the following HTML text that in memory reads" > <p>He said 'arabic arabic arabic arabic' to me.</p> in any of the > major desktop browsers today, no dir is needed for the bidi algorithm > to correctly render the text as > <p>He said 'cibara cibara cibara cibara' to me.</p> Although xml:lang > might be useful to identify the extent of the arabic language, that > declaration has nothing to do with the correct ordering of characters. > > > [2] > === > "Text direction cannot be sufficiently specified by the xml:lang > attribute alone" > > So really I'm saying > > "Text direction cannot be sufficiently specified by the xml:lang > attribute at all." > > > [3] > === > Not sure whether it's worth clarifying this particularly in the text > (particularly since you point to my article, where it is explained), > but... > > Note that it is not solely to deal with punctuation characters that > dir is needed. In fact, in some cases the Unicode RLM and LRM > characters are a better choice (note that RLM and LRM are *not* > referring to the Unicode characters that mirror the effect of dir!). > > dir is most often needed to ensure the correct order of directional > runs, as in the quote 'W3C ,werbeh werbeh' in an overall LTR context, > where the bidi algorithm would have put the W3C over to the right. > > > [4] > === > "This attribute, when set to "ltr" or "rtl", overrides the > default Unicode bidirectional algorithm on neutral characters > (such as spaces and punctuation)." > > It doesn't actually override the algorithm - only the rlo and > lro do that, and as mentioned above, it's use is not limited > to neutral characters. You could say, instead, "This > attribute, when set to "ltr" or "rtl", is intended to resolve > cases of ambiguous directionality in bidirectional text." > > > [5] > === > "This attribute is usually used in conjunction with the > xml:lang attribute, to override the default Unicode > bidirectional algorithm that applies to the specified language." > > Again, I would remove this. > > > [6] > === > "then if the document element specifies the xml:lang > attribute, the Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm must be > applied to the specified language" > > The bidi algorithm should be applied and work independently > of whether or not a language has been declared, since it > operates on the basis of the characters in the text. Again, > this and other references to use of xml:lang for direction > are inappropriate. > > > [7] > === > "Directionality is inferred from the xml:lang value. Every > language has an associated directionality (left-to-right or > right-to-left, also termed LTR or RTL). For example, for > English this default direction is LTR and for Hebrew it's RTL." > > Again, I strongly disagree with this. I think this should > say something > like: > > "The default direction of a document is LTR. This can be > overridden by use of the dir attribute set to "rtl"." > > Note also that it is currently not defined what should happen > if the language of a document is not defined by the author, > which is another reason to use the wording I suggest. > > > Hope that helps, > Richard. > > > ============ > Richard Ishida > Internationalization Lead > W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) > >
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