Frequently Asked Questions and Selected Resources on Cyrillic Multilingual Computing

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Original

Kevin S. Hawkins, "Frequently Asked Questions and Selected Resources on Cyrillic Multilingual Computing" Slavic & East European Information Resources, Vol. 6, No. 2/3 (Binghampton, NY: Haworth, 2005): 3–21 [preprint, doi:10.1300/J167v06n02_02]

Corrections

• In question 15, I said that the list software behind SLAVLIBS strips the encoding declaration out of all messages. The software used since April 27, 2006, does not do this any more, so subscribers to this list are able to send messages with Cyrillic in the body. However, all the other cautions against doing so in email do still apply.
• In question 18, I discussed the use of vernacular scripts in the 880 field in addition to transliteration in other fields. I was referring to Model A for multiscript bibliographic records, as documented in MARC 21 Concise Bibliographic: Multiscript Records. Please note that MARC 21 records can be created according to Model B as well, in which the vernacular text is used in place of transliteration. However, this model is not common practice in Western libraries.
• In the selected bibliography, the resource by Drozd is now:

  American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages. "Russifying your Computer." <http://www.aatseel.org/fonts> (accessed December 20, 2007).

Additional questions

18. I have software that was written for a localized version of Windows sold abroad, but when I use the software on my version of Windows, Cyrillic characters don't look right. Is there a way to get this software to work on my version of Windows?

Yes. You need to change the system locale to the one for which the software was written, or a similar compatible one. There are directions for changing to the Russian system locale online. On newer versions of Windows this process is easy and reversible, but on older ones it is difficult and often not reversible.

19. How do you use Unicode to represent the "ligatures" used in LC transliteration?

MARBI proposal no. 2004-08 explains which Unicode chartacters to use for Tagalog and Cyrillic Romanization. The ligatures are combining diacritical marks in Unicode, which must be entered after the base character, not before it as in MARC-8 encoding. In the case of ligatures for transliteration, the first character to be joined counts as the base character. So to transliterate Cyrillic ц, enter Latin t, then chracter U+0361, and then s.

There are different methods for inserting characters like U+0361 which are not accessible from your keyboard. Different operating systems and applications provide different methods, and often there is more than one method for doing so.

Additions to selected bibliography

Bausenbach, Ardie. "Character Sets and Character Encoding: A Brief Introduction." RLG DigiNews, Vol. 8, No. 2 (Mountain View, CA: RLG, 2004). <http://www.rlg.org/en/page.php?Page_ID=17068#article2> (accessed March 19, 2007).

This overview of character encoding schemes for tech services librarians is heavily linked to definitions of terms used and to resources referenced.

Brownie, John. Ukekele: Mac OS X Keyboard Layout Editor. <http://scripts.sil.org/ukelele> (accessed December 20, 2007).

This freeware program provides a graphical interface for editing keyboard layouts for Mac OS X 10.2 and later.

Teaching and Learning with Technology. "Tips for Developing Non-English Web Sites." Computing with Accents, Symbols, and Foreign Scripts. <http://tlt.its.psu.edu/suggestions/international/> (accessed March 19, 2007).

Despite its name, this site is not only for web developers. As the site says, "This page describes the basics of Unicode for foreign language and what kinds of utilities are needed for foreign language support." It describes settings for common programs and describes different ways of accomplishing common tasks. The advice is direct but fully aware of web standards.

Vidakovic, M. and Milijasevic, I. Keyboard Layout Manager. <http://www.klm32.com/> (accessed December 20, 2007).

This shareware program allows you "to create and modify Microsoft keyboard layout files" for nearly all versions of Windows.