> Hi folks, a friend of mine here in the Montreal area (Kanesatake) is
> looking for software that will allow him to create a character set that
> allows for Mohawk specific accented characters. Is there anyone out
> there that knows of such software or (Better yet) has a character set
> already prepared for this?
I don't know the particular orthography used to transcribe Mohawk, but
suspect that you need glottalized consonants. This is a common obstacle
for many Native languages, including Nez Perce. I have a few suggestions,
but perhaps other replies will contain some better ones...
Let me first describe my needs to see if we are thinking about the same
things:
1) I need to be able to keyboard characters such that I can print or show
on screen transcriptions of Nez Perce language which includes a great
deal of glottalized consonants unavailable in all languages which I have
found faces for.
2) I also require that I can program an electronic scanner to recognize
Nez Perce orthography.
3) I need to be able to kern, adjust the leading, prepare documents in a
variety of point sizes, and print in both italic and gothic styles.
4) I do not require an upper case set.
Hopefully, most of your concerns are addressed above. Here are some
things I've tried or looked into but haven't had the $ to try yet...
1) At present I've been placing the apostrophe after the consonant to
indicate a glottalized consonant. I've used a question mark to indicate a
glottal stop. Because I don't require upper case characters, I can use
upper case characters to indicate accented vowels or marked consonants (a
capital "L" for a lateral spirant, for example). Nez Perce rarely uses
raised "W's" (such as the salishan languages use) and so I can get away
with using an upper case "W" for this. This method works alright for my
own use, but does not resolve my OCR problem nor makes for a very
"legible" proof. Still, it works and doesn't require anything.
2) I once produced a book which included Nez Perce terms. I used an
asterisk following a consonant to "mark" glottalized consonants and later
went back and tweaked the kerning to place an apostrophe over the
consonant. Glottal stops were entered as question marks and the dots at
the bottom were "whited-out" on the proofs. This was time-consuming, but
again, it worked, and at the time saved my publisher the $600 it cost for
a new face (more if I needed special characters).
3) Dr. Haruo Aoki, former head of the Department of Asian Languages, had
custom balls made for his IBM typewriter and (later) a daisy-wheel
printer. As I recall, this wasn't too expensive, though, somewhat archaic
today.
4) Now, the better options...I know of three commercial programs
available for font creation. Of the three, I liked Fontographer the best,
and it seemed to get the best reviews. (See Publish Magazine for more
info and suppliers as well as alternative programs--they've done reviews
in past issues, I don't have my copies here so you'll have to look it
up). Last summer the educational price was about $180 (US). Be aware that
creation of a font will require alot of time and knowledge of copyright
restrictions on particular faces. If you're new to this, you may want to
explore another option. If you're not willing to pay for rights, you may
want to completely design a face instead of altering an existing, or find
some of the public domain faces such as are often posted on bulletin
boards. Mostly, it depends on your future needs.
5) I also saw in Publish! Magazine, about a couple years ago, a full-page
advertisement for a company that would create a typeface of your
handwriting for about $79. The application form, however, could easily
accept more formal letterforms (such as letraset or even pressed letters)
so that you could easily design an inexpensive face. Again, I don't have
my copies of the magazine here with me, and so can't give you more
details. The advertisement was a pull-out affair--the form for the
letters was inserted into the magazine. I never looked into it any
further since I needed more flexibility than one face would provide.
6) You can hire a face designer. I don't know what the going rates are,
but you can probably find a design or typography student in a university
that will design a face for your use. Tulalip Tribe's Cultural Resource
Division purchased a Salishan face from a designer on Vancouver Island a
couple years ago for $180 (US). Henry Gobin, Jr. Head of Cultural
Resources for Tulalip Tribes (Marysville, WA USA) can give you details
(area code 206).
7) If you, like me, need to program a scanner to provide OCR capabilities
for native languages, you will need to look at Omnipage Professional
(it's their top-of-the-line package and not cheap; their lower packages
won't do it) Caere's the manufacturer. They assure me that this program
will allow the programming of special character set recognition--coupled
with a specially designed typeface you have the capability of scanning
texts printed in native languages. Be aware that this is also a
time-consuming process and one of constant fiddling. I don't recall if
there's a educational price on it. If I remember correctly, the full
package runs for just under $500.
8) There simply must be a face designed for linguists that will accomodate
our needs--does anyone out there know how to find out about these?