Von: fpbusser@cybercable.tm.fr (Francis Busser) Datum: 23.11.98, 14:25:12 Betreff: Re: AW: [SWITZERLAND-L] "Good Old Conventions" vs umlats Seelentag Wolfhart KSSG_RO wrote: > > Dear Joanne, > > I don't believe there is a "standard" : is quite commonly used in > German speaking countries, but <"a> or are "American inventions" - I > have seen <"a> more often, and this I also learned from the "German > Genealogy" general help page; I have to admit, however, that looks more > logical to me, considering how the umlauts evolved ;-). Conclusion ? I feel > it doesn't matter too much as in most cases the meaning will be clear either > way. > > Best regards to all - Wolf > > > ---------- > > Von: Joanne Mello[SMTP:jomello@innercite.com] > > Gesendet: Sonntag, 22. November 1998 20:55 > > An: SWITZERLAND-L@rootsweb.com > > Betreff: [SWITZERLAND-L] "Good Old Conventions" vs umlats > > > > Wolf: > > > > I'm wondering about using <"a> as opposed to for umlauts. My German > > contact uses the <"> AFTER the letter. Which is preferable? > > > > Joanne > > > > --------------------------------- > > I can therefore only strongly advice to stay away from these characters > > when > > e-mailing. Just stick to the good old conventions like for a-umlaut, > > or > > (looks less familiar to the German speaking person) <"a> if you want to > > state explicitely that you mean the umlaut, ....... > Dear friends, All this makes unnecessary complications with our european languages. I think I can tell you a lot about, as my family has Alsacian, Swiss, French, German, Maggyar and Scottish roots (nobody is prefect !) I recommend definitively to communicate 8 bits and to use an international ISO alphabet like 8859-1. As an example, the 'Buser' or 'Busser' lineage is not the same as the 'Bsser' or 'Buesser', nor the 'Bausser' or 'Busser'. The trick with ' or " before or after the marked character is only a childplay to help by out of age computer systems. At CP/M times it was usage in french to figure (e accent aigu) with 'e and (e accent grave) with e' (so the word dpartement had to be written d'epartement and not de'partement). The accent change the sense of the words. If I wish to write "je dcide d'caler ma rcolte d'amandes" (I decide to hull my crop of almonds) or "je prfre dcaler ma rcolte d'amandes" (I find better to gather in my almonds later), with the ' trick I must write "je d'ecide d'ecaler ma r'ecolte d'amandes" and "je pr'efe're d'ecaler ma r'ecolte d'amandes" (both cases can or not mean the same, but in both the sense itself is always ambiguous). With names, how can I distinguish between D'Evricourt and Dvricourt if I must write both d'evricourt ? In German the problem is the same. With the trick, both names 'Dusser' and 'Dasser' can be written the same way : 'Da"usser'. Simple and reliable isn't it ? My conviction is that History and genealogy need both greatest precision and greatest fidelity to the documents. If not we fall in mythology. I cannot find any technical justification to encode on 7 bits rather than on 8 bits. Encoding the textes on 7 bits is not shorter and not faster as on 8 bits. All modern 'Internet Browsers' or mailing programs can be configurated to allow 8 bits. 'Netscape's Navigator' aswell as 'Microsoft's Internet Explorer' can both be obtained for free. One of the best existing mailing programs, 'Pegasus Mail' is free also. 'Outlook Express' is delivered with 'Windows-98' or can be downloaded for free. If your computer is too old to support a modern browser, you can always find not too old second hand computers at very, very low prices, often less than 100 $. Don't worry about 7-bit transmission on the Internet. Your 8-bits message is automatically translated by the front-end server of your access provider into 'quoted printable', a 7-bits format in which the characters above 127 are expressed by her hexadecimal value. So the French word 'Amitis' (friendships) is translated in 'Amiti=E9s'. The data are transported packed in the 7-bits format and can transit without difficulties over 20 years old links, reliefs of the primitive 'Arpanet'. As an example, in the 'source' of your message you can find a cryptic commands like : X-MIME-Autoconverted: from 8bit to quoted-printable by front6.grolier.fr id VAA19694 for the translation in the ASCII 7-bits format, Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit for the transmission, and a little later : X-MIME-Autoconverted: from quoted-printable to 8bit by fp-1.rootsweb.com id MAA23236 meaning that at the other end of the transmission, the front-end server of the destination has reversed the translation. The operations become transparent if the particular email software used at each end, can both handle 8 bits. Indeed, from time to time it can happen that an error occurs and the reverse translation fails. In this case, try to resend your mail, or use 'Melquote', a little conversion utility from quoted-printable to ISO (to find for free on the web, at http://www.mygale.org/11/ptorris ). In Europe, you find often 8-bits transmisssions and the command is : Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit You can also configure your browser to the 'MIME / Quoted Printable' format, if the front end processor of your Internet Access Provider from behind the moon does not allow 8 bits. One cannot be seriously a 7 bits genealogist. If your keyboard has not the right layout to write in some foreign languages, you can under Windows-95/98, reach all the european characters by holding the Alt key down while you enter the following four-digit code on the NUMERIC keypad. The character will appear as soon you release the Alt key : 0138 0139 0140 0141 0142 0143 0144 0145 ' 0146 ' 0147 " 0148 " 0149 o 0150 - 0151 - 0152 0153 0154 0155 0156 0157 0158 0159 0160 0161 0162 0163 0164 0165 0166 0167 0168 0169 0170 0171 0172 0173 0174 0175 0176 0177 0178 0179 0180 0181 0182 0183 0184 + 0185 0186 0187 0188 0189 0190 0191 0192 0193 0194 0195 0196 0197 0198 0199 0200 0202 0202 0203 0204 0205 0206 0207 0208 0209 0210 0211 0212 0213 0214 0215 0216 0217 0218 0219 0220 0221 0222 0223 0224 0225 0226 0227 0228 0229 0230 0231 0232 0233 0234 0235 0236 0237 0238 0239 0240 0241 0242 0243 0244 0245 0246 0247 0248 0249 0250 0251 0252 0253 0254 0255 On this way, you can write not only in english, german or french, but also in Icelandish, Finnish, Swedish, Italian, Spanish, Serbish, Polish, Turkish and many more from our languages. You have also an alternative access to some characters with Alt- and the well known tree-digits codes : 142 132 133 160 131 128 135 137 138 130 136 139 141 161 140 165 164 153 148 149 147 154 129 150 159 152 225 230 156 159 168 173 166 172 171 249 241 246 248 253 The third way, but not the fastest, is to pick and paste the characters from Windows's Characters Table. Dream sweet on 8 bits ! Avec les amitis de Francis Busser (in Alsace, France) PS : I hope that with my Alsacian humour, I become not kicked out from the lists as it happened to Michael Bernet and his Alsaco-Jewish humour.