Scanrom Sanskrit Font

[Sid Harth]

On  1-MAY-1995 13:55:35.2 jdwhite said to BAKULA
   > I am in the process of trying to determine what is the best and most
   >"user friendly" Sanskrit font for PC usage.  We are considering one
   >from Latitude International in Sunnyvale, California; another from
   >Intellectual Property Solution (via WeCare Technologies in Dallas,
   >Tx.); and another from Lingusit's Software in Edmonds, Washington).  I
   >would be most grateful if you would give me the details on the Scanrom
   >software you have been testing. Price, its "user-friendly" qualities,
   >font point(s), incorporation of English notes within the Sanskrit
   >text, etc.  As the computer science graduate student assistant working
   >with me is leaving for India within the week, a reply as soon as
   >possible would help him to advise me on the purchase.  I am primarily
   >interested in the product for tying Sanskrit manuscripts onto disk and
   >"manipulating the texts to create scholarly editions with textual
   >variant readings.
   > Thanks for your efforts on behalf of all of us who are not as computer
   > literate or as adventuresome as you!

     Thanks for your kind words. Now, I must prove my worth.

     I have earlier posted my deep doubts about Scanrom offer. I am glad
that some of you are depending on my dispassionate critique of this product.
I would advise you not to pay much attention to the Scanrom offer. It has
problems with individual fonts, keyboard mapping to the most familiar
IBM/Qwerty standard format, lack of support and pertinent documentation
vis-a-vis hardware compatibility. Unprofessional designing of some of the
individual fonts. This may be due to the unfamiliarity of the designer of
the aesthetic forms of the language glyphs. Some fonts are totally
unsuitable for "copy". Copy, here, is used as a technical term for
advertising copy. Some variations in a particular font may have been used
as "filler" to enlarge the final number (758+758).

Sid (VidvAn wannabe) Harth  "Svadeshe pujyate rAjA vidvAn sarvatra pujyate"