Problems working in Greek text (Unicode).

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mwdiers
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Problems working in Greek text (Unicode).

Post by mwdiers »

In Nisus, I am consistently have an issue when pasting Greek text from Logos 4 for Mac.

Any time the text contains a Greek semicolon (which looks like a raised dot), I am getting an upper-case Sigma, which I believe is being used as the "default" character for an unmatched unicode character.

If I paste the exact same text into Mellel OR into TextEdit the semicolon is displayed properly. Also, if I copy the text out of Mellel or TextEdit, and paste it into Nisus, again, the semicolon is displayed properly.

I am using the same fonts in Logos as in Mellel/Nisus/TextEdit.

This is not a problem unique to Nisus, however. Word 2011 is showing the same symptoms. I find it odd that Nisus is having this issue when TextEdit does not.

I am cross-posting this problem to the Logos forums as well. I would not bother posting it here except that everything seems to work fine in Mellel and TextEdit. I'm not sure what to make of the inconsistent behavior, but I know that Unicode support is a beast to implement on a good day.
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Elbrecht
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Re: Problems working in Greek text (Unicode).

Post by Elbrecht »

Well -

I guess it's a mixup of Classical vs Unicode fonts plus Logos handling - it looks like the Greek "semicolon" is actually a Uncicode "middle dot". It's kind of misuse - I don't know neither Greek nor Logos nor the font used in Logos - but Unicode "middle dot" got the same code number as Classical "upper case Sigma" for Western MacRoman fonts. So the fault is either with the Logos font used and/or with entering the Greek text misusing Western "middle dot" for Greek "semicolon". So I would question the logic of Logos in this case - in first place.

HE
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martin
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Re: Problems working in Greek text (Unicode).

Post by martin »

I would guess that it's a problem related to how Logos places text on the pasteboard.
mwdiers wrote:If I paste the exact same text into Mellel OR into TextEdit the semicolon is displayed properly. Also, if I copy the text out of Mellel or TextEdit, and paste it into Nisus, again, the semicolon is displayed properly.

This is not a problem unique to Nisus, however. Word 2011 is showing the same symptoms. I find it odd that Nisus is having this issue when TextEdit does not.
Whenever you copy something, the source application usually makes available the copied content in a variety of formats (eg: RTF, HTML, plain text, etc). Then when you switch to another application and paste, the destination application uses whatever format is most appropriate (or it best understands).

When you paste in Nisus Writer, we will prefer RTF, if that format is available on the pasteboard. Perhaps Word also prefers RTF. But whatever format is used by Nisus Writer, I would guess that Mellel and TextEdit prefer a different format. I suspect the problem is that Logos encodes the semicolon properly for one pasteboard format, but not another.

Of course this is just a hypothesis, as I don't have Logos available for testing. It could very well be that both Nisus Writer and Word 2011 have a bug with decoding Greek semicolons, but that's unlikely.

One way you might work around the issue: when pasting in Nisus Writer, try the "Paste Text Only" menu.

Let us know how it goes, and if you find anything out from the Logos people.
mwdiers
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Re: Problems working in Greek text (Unicode).

Post by mwdiers »

Elbrecht wrote:Well -

I guess it's a mixup of Classical vs Unicode fonts plus Logos handling - it looks like the Greek "semicolon" is actually a Uncicode "middle dot". It's kind of misuse - I don't know neither Greek nor Logos nor the font used in Logos - but Unicode "middle dot" got the same code number as Classical "upper case Sigma" for Western MacRoman fonts. So the fault is either with the Logos font used and/or with entering the Greek text misusing Western "middle dot" for Greek "semicolon". So I would question the logic of Logos in this case - in first place.

HE
I have done some more research and this is what I have found so for:

If I paste plain text into Nisus Pro, the result is the same.

When I paste text into TextEdit, the character that is placed into the file is, as you noted, the "middle dot": 0x00B7. When I copy from TextEdit to Nisus, this works just fine.

Here's where it gets strange: If I paste directly into Nisus Pro, the same character is translated to Unicode: 0x2211. This is the "N-ARY SUMMATION" character in the Mathematecal Operators code page. This character, by the way, looks exactly like an uppercase sigma.

Now, I wonder whether it is really a coincidence that 0x00B7 coincides with a capital Sigma in MacRoman. Could be, I suppose, but it seems far fetched.

The character that SHOULD be used for the Greek "semi-colon" is 0x0387, also known as the "ano teleia". All of my Greek fonts support this character, but none of the text coming out of Logos is using it. Something is fishy in Denmark. I'll see what he Logos people have to say about this.
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Elbrecht
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Re: Problems working in Greek text (Unicode).

Post by Elbrecht »

Both Martins -
Here's where it gets strange: If I paste directly into Nisus Pro, the same character is translated to Unicode: 0x2211. This is the "N-ARY SUMMATION" character in the Mathematecal Operators code page. This character, by the way, looks exactly like an uppercase sigma.

Now, I wonder whether it is really a coincidence that 0x00B7 coincides with a capital Sigma in MacRoman. Could be, I suppose, but it seems far fetched.
The "summation" is a mathematical operator included in all classical MacRoman fonts - part of the socalled Adobe symbols - totally different from the Greek Sigma. Both "Sigmas" are included in the Symbol fonts as well - what looks like just another trouble maker! There seems something wrong with the Logos font encoding - leaving open to different interpretations…

HE

PS : Is there any place to go to download the font concerned?
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Elbrecht
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Re: Problems working in Greek text (Unicode).

Post by Elbrecht »

Martin -

I just copied from the Logos forum:
ἁμαρτία γὰρ ὑμῶν οὐ κυριεύσει·
οὐ γάρ ἐστε ὑπὸ νόμον ἀλλὰ ὑπὸ χάριν.
it's a case of middle dot in Times New Roman. To make things more complicated Times New Roman has a dot operator instead of a middle dot in the font's slot that is occupied by the summation operator in Classical MacRoman. It looks like a trilemma of Classical/Symbol/Unicode conflict for Word and Nisus somehow. Times New Roman is heavily known for bugs of this kind of mismatching - that's why I would try any other font available anyway.

HE
MacBook Pro i5
SSD 840/850 Pro
High Sierra 10.13.6
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