GENBOX-L Archives

Archiver > GENBOX > 2004-12 > 1103294507


From: "Chi Vu" <>
Subject: FW: [GENBOX] FW: Unicode in Notes fields
Date: Fri, 17 Dec 2004 08:41:47 -0600


Hi Bill,

Thanks for looking into the reported problem so promptly. Below are the answers to your questions:

1) The GenBox "About" does show the version to be 3.3.1 U

2) I am not using the Character Map to enter the Vietnamese characters. I am using Unikey (version 3.6 available for free at unikey.sourceforge.net), which is a tool for entering Vietnamese text using the American keyboard.

I don't know much about character encoding but isn't codepage 1258 a Microsoft implementation for Vietnamese characters and not true Unicode? What led me to think the two are distinct is that Unikey has options to choose various encodings such as: Unicode, UTF-8, and Codepage 1258. I have been using strictly their Unicode encoding option and it has worked fine with Word, Access, Outlook and other software. It also worked fine in most fields in GenBox.

Since you mentioned Codepage 1258, I tried that encoding with Unikey, but the characters still did not show up correctly. They no longer show up as ? but as some other incorrect characters. BTW, my Notes field is set to use the font Times New Roman.

3) The Character Map does work but using it is not a viable option. For entering occasional characters it is fine, but for pages and pages of Vietnamese text, I need to use the keyboard, which is where Unikey comes in. It is a widely used software by the Vietnamese community outside of Vietnam.

4) Some characters appear correctly and not others.

The correct ones are: â ô á à é è í ì Đ. These may be common to other languages as well.

The characters that don't work are:
* ơ (lower case o with a hook)
* Ơ (upper case O with a hook)
* ư (lower case u with a hook)
* Ư (upper case U with a hook)
* ă (lower case a with an upside down circumflex on top)
* Ă (upper case A with an upside down circumflex on top)
* The Character Map shows ơ Ơ ư Ư ă Ă to range from U+01A0 to U+01CE.
* đ (lower case d with a horizontal tick through the ascend) U+0111
* None of the characters in the range of U+1EA0 to U+1EF9 such as ủ ồ ự ỹ ễ

5) Those characters that don't work show up as question marks immediately. You asked whether they show up correctly at first and then switches to a question mark. That behavior I observed in Family Tree Maker 2005, but not in GenBox. Just curious about what's happening there?

I am using Outlook and Unikey to compose this email. In case the Vietnamese characters don't show up correctly with your email reader, I included the rough description of each character in the above answers.

Hope this helps to track down the problem.

Thanks again,
Chi

-----Original Message-----
From: William T. Flight [mailto:]
Sent: Thursday, December 16, 2004 4:00 PM
To:
Subject: RE: [GENBOX] FW: Unicode in Notes fields

Hi Chi,

I took a look at the UNICODE in notes fields. I'm not seeing the problem entering Vietnamese characters under Windows XP.

Check that you are running the UNICODE version of Genbox: Click "About Genbox Family History" from the help menu, and verify that your version number is "3.3.1 U", the "U" means you are running the UNICODE version.

I did uncover a problem with entering characters from double-byte character sets (DBCS). I have that corrected in the next version, but that will only help entry of Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and Thai. The Vietnamese codepage (1258) is a single-byte character set.

I'm using the Character Map to choose Vietnamese characters to enter. Does that method work for you?

Regarding what you are seeing: do you get question marks for every character, or are there some Vietnamese characters that show correctly in notes fields?

Do the characters appear correctly initially, but then change into question marks after you click on a different tab and return?

Thanks,

--Bill

William T. Flight
http://www.thoughtfulcreations.com

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Chi Vu [mailto:]
> Sent: Monday, December 13, 2004 10:48 AM
> To:
> Subject: [GENBOX] FW: Unicode in Notes fields
>
> Hello,
>
>
>
> Unicode characters (in the Vietnamese code range) appear
> correctly in most fields (e.g. name), but have problems in
> the Notes field. They appear as question mark (?) in the
> Notes field. Some of those characters are ử, ế, ặ.
>
>
>
> Am I doing something wrong or is it indeed a problem. If the
> latter then does any one know of a work-around?
>
>
>
> Thanks,
>
> Chi
>
>
>
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