Subject: JIS, GB, Big5, Unicode

From: Yolin H u a n g <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 23 Nov 1991 13:07:10 EST

ref: ------------------------------------------------------------------
Date:         Tue, 19 Nov 1991 15:26:15 -0500
From:         Stephen G Simpson <[email-masked]>
Subject:      Pinyin input for ETEN.  BIG-5 versus GB.
Comments: To: [email-masked]

I think a lot of people have wondered about GB versus BIG-5 character
codes.  BIG-5 is in a sense much better, because it includes about 13000
characters, compared to about 7000 for GB.  Also, since BIG-5 is keyed to
traditional rather than simplified characters, it is more suitable for
classical Chinese literature and for everyday use in the United States
and indeed most parts of the world, except mainland China.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

for those who are sentimentally attached to GB, this is probably hard to
swallow, and demoralizing.  But, we can consider 'simplified character'
as a style or font, as so successfully demonstrated by Ben Ao in his
CWP.  Actually, for those educated in traditional way, many people also
write in various simplified styles in everyday routine.  The 'simplified
style' has the merit of facing (and formalizing) this fact from the
grass-root, in a way quite American (cowboy, blue jean, New Orlean Blue).

'Pinyin' is in fact derived (romanized) directly from 'bopomofo' phonetic
system, which was developed around the turn of the century; which again
was developed along the line of Japanese 'kana' phonetic system since
there were many Chinese studying in Japan at the time; and 'kana' was
first developed in Japan during Nara and Heian period by woman folks to
simplify hand writing of the heavy Han writing system from the Continent
prefered by the literati.

Since GB code covers fewer characters, it is sufficient for beginners.
For learned dons, Big5 offers a larger coverage, sometimes necessary for
richness and depth.  For the upcoming Unicode, I would like to see a
coverage no less than Big5's.  Maybe, Unicode can cover all characters in
the celebrated 'Kang Xi Zi Dian' (with some studied corrections), plus
some characters used only regionally such as in Japan and Hong Kong, and
as a superset to Big5, GB, and Japanese JIS; if the OS (Operation System)
can stand it.  If the OS can not handle it, it can be separated in several
subset files depending upon their statistical freqency of usage in each
community, and personal preference.  I think it is unwise to keep
different writing styles in the same code, and each occupying a code
number slot.  Each community can have their own prefered font file for
display and printing.  And one user might consider several fonts for
style and appearance.  For instance, a compendium of celebrated classical
brush writings by famed historical personalities can contain many choices
for a single character.  People may want to print in Yan style (Yan
ZhenQin), or Wang style (Wang XiZhi), or many other styles.

A single format is better than the warring state of Beta and VHS.  A
unified HDTV is better than NTSC, PAL, and SECAM.  I think for
conservative Japanese literati, a superset in the form of a wise and fair
choice of Unicode will be appreciable.

Yolin Huang.

Appendix:
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: [email-masked] (Hidekazu TOZAKI)
Subject: Re: Chinese-Japanese kanji
Date: 21 Nov 91 12:08:40 GMT
Organization: Faculty of Sci. and Tech., Keio Univ., Yokohama, Japan.

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked]
 (Jacques Garrigue) writes:
 >!   To speak of Chinese kanji may sound as redundant. But introduction of
 >! Chinese ideograms in Japanese has not been done all at once, and some
 >! variations appeared.
 >!
 >!   Up to a 50 years ago they were still very similar, but simplifications
 >! on both sides have made it much more difficult.

 Yes, the following is quoted (with ">&") from what I posted to
comp.std.internat a month or two ago.

###  I wrote it in a hurry and for another purpose, but I have no time    ###
### now to modify it, so please, please ignore the digressive parts, (and ###
### sorry for many grammatical mistakes.)                                 ###

 >&  In 1716 Chinese Emperor ordered some specialists to make Kanji
 >& dictionary, which is named Kouki-Jiten after the name of the Emperor.
 >& (I don't know its chinese pronounciation and spelling, sorry.) This
		    note: I've now learnt its Chinese name "Kang Xi Zidian".
 >& has been used as the standard for long years both in China and Japan.
 >& (Perhaps there are some differences between them but I don't know the
 >& differences in detail.) Almost all kanji dictionaries *now* published
 >& in Japan are listed these characters as "Seiji" (of which direct
						<Zhen Zi>
 >& translation into English is perhaps "correct character".) What we use
 >& in prewar era is now called Kyuuji (Old Character) which is very close
				<Jiu Zi>
 >& to this Seiji. After the War, in 1946, Japanese government established
 >& "Touyou Kanji" system which limits our Kanji usage to 1,850 Kanjis,
 >& and some of the Kanjis in it are simplified its shapes. This is called
 >& Shinji (New Character). But many cultural people didn't accept this
 >& change, continue to use Kyuuji. There are still many books in Japan
 >& printed in this Kyuuji, and cultural people *now* can read/write this
 >& Kyuuji. (Why this Shinji is so disliked is this: all simplified
 >& characters are in that 1,850 sets, so when one write a kanji, if the
 >& kanji is within the set, one must write it in simplified shape, and if
 >& the kanji is without the set, one must write it in old style, even if
 >& they have common parts. This forces us to memorize whether the kanji
 >& one now want to write is within the set or not. This is none other
 >& than the nonsence.) In 1981 "Touyou Kanji" is revised to "Jouyou
 >& Kanji", but there's no big changes of situation.
 >&
 >&  Now, Kyuuji and Shinji are confused by such reasons, some of Japanese
 >& (including me) may prefer Kyuuji for some words; in other words, some
 >& Japanese distinguish Kyuuji and Shinji as a different character;
 >& especially for personal names and place names. It is quite natural
 >& that, if someone (even government) forces one to change his/her name
 >& on behalf of his/her character is Seiji but not the standard (i.e.
 >& Shinji), he/she deny such demand, isn't it? (Even if it is not a
 >& Seiji, if he/she want to use the character, it should never be
 >& prohibited by any kind of power.)
 >&
 >& #  In another word, Japanese government failed to standarized Kanji, so
 >& # there are widely used both Kyuuji and Shinji. I again insist, there do
 >& # exists some people who distingusihed them *consciously*, they must be
 >& # distingusihed.
 >&
 >&  On the other hands, in 1965, China has made Kantaiji (I don't know
 >& its Chinese spelling, sorry) which is also simplified from Seiji, but
 >& *very much* different with Japanese Shinji. Since I have never learned
 >& modern Chinese Language, I cannot read most of the Kantaiji, i.e. I
 >& can't understand which Japanese Character (Whether Shinji or Kyuuji)
 >& corresponds to the Kantaiji. I don't know how the Chinese feel this
 >& Kantaiji.
 >&
 >&  And in Taiwan as far as I know there's no big changes about Kanji,
 >& that means the character which is close to Seiji is used.

>From here I've newly added:

 As for Seiji, there also exist who have another point of view; since
even Kouki Jiten have some (not so few) mistakes, more older kanjis as
in "Setsumon-Kaiji" (I don't know whose chinese name) are correct
  <Shuo Wen Jie Zi>
ones. Some call such kanji's Honji whose direct translation would be
                           <Ben Zi>
"original character". (There are another naming for kanji also, but
here, I follow this situation to the word usage of Seiji and Honji,
i.e. Seiji is Kouki-Jiten style, Honji is Setsumon-Kaiji style
basically.)

 If one decide what is Seiji, another kanjis are regarded as
non-standardor variation, which we call Itaiji. If you know some
					<Yi Ti Zi>
examples for Itaiji, the following book is convenient.

Katsumi YAMADA (ed), Itaiji Kaidoku Jiten
	Kashiwa Shobo, 1987, ISBN 4-7601-0332-5, 1 800 yen

 >!   Even without it, some characters were created in Japan (kokuji), some
 >! of them very frequent. And many Chinese characters are not used in Japan,
 >! mostly for grammatical reasons.

 I also know onw kanji dictionary with only kokuji.

Yoshizo SUGAWARA (ed.), Kokuji no Jiten,
	Tokyodo Shuppan, 1990, ISBN 4-490-10279-8, 2 000 yen

 >!   Maybe the best way to see differences between Chinese and Japanese is
 >! to have a look at a 'kanwa jiten', a dictionary of Chinese character for
 >! Japanese. It explains about the writing, the original meaning (in China)
 >! and its in Japan.

 Usual Japanese Kanwa Jiten dose not include Chinese Kantaiji as an
item, but some list the table of the difference as an appendix. As the
Chinese simplification is regular (in comparison with Japanese ones),
they might probably not list the whole table but some rules to
simplify. But I know one Kanji dictionary meant for beginners for
Japanese (i.e. written in English.)

Jack Halpern et al. (ed.), New Japanese-English Character Dictionary
	 Kenkyusha Ltd., 1990, ISBN 4-7674-9040-5, 8,000 yen

 This kanji dictionary is meant for to read and write Japanese, but
have its Chinese Kantaiji for each kanji. (It has also interesting
systems for searching for kanjis, I think it is more convenient for
foreigners than using Bushu (radical) systems.)

--
Hidekazu TOZAKI
Faculty of Science and Technology, Keio University, Yokohama, Japan.
E-mail: [email-masked]