Please do not package this font as is. It purports to cover the KharoááhÄ block, but all the author did is copy the illustrative glyphs from Unicode 4.1 into the corresponding encoding slots. However, in common with the modern Indian scripts, a KharoááhÄ font also needs contextual replacement mechanisms (e.g. via OpenType) and a lot of additional composite glyphs to support the script. In the absence of these features, such a font with pseudoâsupport for a complex script X is liable to confuse fontconfig and get in the way of other fonts that do in fact support script X. The more so if the font with pseudoâsupport _appears_ to be covering a wide range of scripts, like this one. (This is also the biggest problem with the âFree UCS Outline Fontsâ, which contain the basic glyphs of, e.g., Devanagari, but none of the required replacement mechanisms or composite glyphs.)
So I request that at a minimum, you remove the KharoááhÄ range from this font unless and until it provides real and complete support of the script. That said, (some of) the other Plane 1 scripts that this font covers may work on a simple characterâtoâglyph basis, and it would be a welcome addition to have those available. But please check which ones of them suffer from insufficient support like KharoááhÄ (hPhagsâpa, for instance). My colleague Andrew Glass is the main author of the KharoááhÄ Unicode encoding, and he is now working on a proper KharoááhÄ font. When that font is completed, we will make sure to submit it for inclusion in Debian GNU/Linux. And of course we are very pleased that people are interested in support for KharoááhÄ. Itâs just a little bit more complicated than putting those sixtyâodd glyphs in a font. If youâd like to develop a real KharoááhÄ font yourself, you are absolutely welcome. The description of contextual replacement mechanisms is apparently not yet available from the Unicode website, but you could check out our original encoding proposal at http://depts.washington.edu/ebmp/downloads/Kharoshthi.pdf and work from there. Best regards, Stefan Baums -- Stefan Baums Asian Languages and Literature University of Washington
