Blueberry Research

[Wayne Steele <xmlmaster@hotmail.com>]

In the interest of getting opinions from some minority language users, I 
have had some discussions with Gavin Nesbitt at the Legislative Assembly of 
Nunavut.

Here's what he had to say about XML Blueberry, when asked about what effect 
the omission of Unicode 3.0 characters from XML Names has had, and if he 
would create tags in this script were it added.

I find his observation about the effect of Unicode 3.0 inclusion 
interesting. Will XML inclusion help give a boost to languages that need it?

<Quote>
I think if the question is whether Inuktitut can viably take advantage of
enhancements and revisions to the XML standard my answer would be we will
certainly never know if the changes are not made. I can state that the same
questions would have been raised prior to syllabics being included in
Unicode 3.0. I can very much assure you that the status of Inuktitut is
already benefiting from it's inclusion - in fact, I would say that Unicode
has provided a significant boost to the long term viability of Inuktitut in
the modern world.

Certainly Inuktitut has been limited in the past by a lack of computer
standards...We are only now in the last two years seeing the possibilities
that Unicode presents. If XML is going to purport to be a global computing
standard I do not think it can do so with any validity if it does not
support the full Unicode range.
</Quote>

Background:

Inuktitut is the Inuit (Eskimo) language, and uses the "Canadian Aboriginal 
Syllabics" characters introduced in Unicode 3.0.

Nunavut is the newest Canadian Territory. In the far north, it was formed as 
a result of a settlement between the Canadian Government and the Inuit.

-Wayne Steele

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