[indiana-discuss] [i18n-discuss] OpenSolaris 2008.11 build_98 test res

[W. Wayne Liauh]

> 
> Regards,
> -shinobu

Thanks for the reply.  But please do not lose sight that the most critical issue is the ("Chinese") glyph matching problem in the OpenSolaris version of OpenOffice.org.  I have been screaming bloody murder about this problem ever since the OpenSolaris project was launched more than three years ago.  If Sun is interested in growing OpenSolaris market in the greater China region at all, this is a problem that has to be solved--I think it should be quite obvious that there is no choice.  I am glad that someone like yourself who is in a position to implement changes is finally paying attention to this matter.  I don't think it is too late, but three years is a very long time for such a critical (but, technically speaking, should be very trivial) problem to finally have a chance to be addressed.

To, again, give those non-Chinese speakers a glimpse of how serious this problem is, I am posting a screenshot of OOo 3.0.0 running in os2008.11_98:

http://tinyurl.com/ooo3zhsol

Counting from the bottom up, the first file is supposed to be the (Chinese) name of President Hu Jintao of China, but it is so garbled that no one can recognize what it stands for.  The next file up is the name of China's next President, the Honorable Xi Jinping (Dr. Xi and I share a common trait in that both of us were chemical engineers before we went to law school :-)  ).  One of the three characters was shown as a rectangle.

And don't assume that no one else is paying attention to details.  During my most recent trip to Taipei, an engineer at one of my clients' shop asked me to type in the name of Dr. Xi's beautiful and widely and fondly respected wife (she is one of the most popular--and best--opera singers in China).  Lo and behold, her name was also terribly garbled.  Her middle name was replaced with two rectangles, each of which encroaches a respective neighboring character, making her name totally unrecognizable.  This is the worst case I have seen.

As I mentioned in one of my previous posts, there is a workaround to this problem:


http://tinyurl.com/ooo3zhsol-a

I am also posting another screenshot combining the two above screenshots to make an easier comparison as to what should look like (with this workaround) and what it actually looks:

http://tinyurl.com/ooo3zhsol-b

One of the side effects of this workaround is that the western fonts become very ugly.  But the most detrimental consequence is that, every time we want to suggest someone to install OpenSolaris, we also will have to explain that b/c we are so incompetent, we have to do a workaround so that the Chinese glyphs will not be garbled--so that we will not be accused to have a hidden agenda that is disrespectful to China's current and future leaders.  No animus, just incompetence.  Please excuse us.

We actually presented this problem to Sun's former president of Engineering and Research Institute (of China) many years ago, but received no help.  Subsequently, one of the local Linux developers "patched the OOo code" (whatever that means) and solved this problem--for Linux.  Ironically, at that time, Solaris was the only operating system that did not have this problem (& still doesn't).  But now, OpenSolaris is the only operating system that has problems.  Not in Linux, and not in Windows.  How wind can change!

Also as I mentioned in one of my previous posts, I don't have any problem displaying Kanji in OpenOffice.org, regardless whether it is in en_US, zh, or ja_JP locales.  In light of the recent significant improvements in OpenSolaris, leaving this (seemingly trivial) problem unsolved--and thus effectively shutting ourselves off from the China market--is very unfair to those who have worked so hard and for so long.

Regarding hiring interns.  As I mentioned previously, I have done my own share (of hiring interns to work on this problem), but we did not go anywhere (what should be "trivial" to Sun is definitely not trivial for me).  OTOH, if Sun can help training smart, aggressive, ambitious, self-motivated students who have a strong desire to return to their home towns to start their own businesses (or to work with one of our clients, or other IP outfits), I have always thought this is one of the best ways to assist the spread of OpenSolaris.  Please don't take my offer as an insult.
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