[mb-style] Re: Re: [Clean up CSG] Capitalization (and placement)

[Bogdan Butnaru]

I'm sorry to intrude on a conversation I'm not very involved with due
to my unfamiliarity with CSG, but I might contribute a few technical
points:

1) I'm not sure which character Lauri talks about what nobody anywhere
can't type at all, it seems to be one of the emdash/endash/figuredash
characters.
  a) I can type both, but I have a custom keyboard layout
(incidentally it allows a few hundred of the most common diacritic
combinations, and MB was a reason in creating it)
  b) a grep in my keyboard layouts folder says that 25% of the layouts
there (part of XKB, provided by default with almost all modern Linux
distributions) contain either of them. These are standard layouts, not
Linux specific, so are likely available.
  c) things like Latex (and I think some wikis) allow using two or
three dashes to type en/em dashes. It's relatively easy to have a
convention (just type "--" if you mean "–" and "---" if you mean "—",
and use automatic search-and-replace to fix them at any later point).

2) The "figure dash" someone mentioned is a _separator_, and only
between figures. That is, things like telephone numbers (123-4567) or
catalog numbers (though it's not useful in things like "DD-123-CD",
because there aren't just figures there). It's NOT for intervals. It's
only important because it has the same width as figures, and only in
fonts that have same-width figures, and only for alignment purposes,
eg. in tables. The endash is universally used for intervals, as in
"parts 1–5". See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dash for a simple
explication.

Generally only the dash, en-dash and em-dash are important in 99.9% of
anything I saw on MusicBrainz. The only other one that might be useful
is minus, which I've seen in very few mathematically-based song
titles. The latter is rare enough that copy paste or a charmap are
enough, and it's not needed for classical, I'd think. The last can be
easily used with -, -- and --- for input, and a simple replacement. Is
there another that was proposed?

On Jan 29, 2008 3:55 PM, Lauri Watts <krazykiwi at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Jan 29, 2008 2:49 PM, Brian Schweitzer
> <brian.brianschweitzer at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > The CSG is already terrifying.  I do not see this particular change
> > > improving that situation, and it doesn't make sense to me, and I do
> > > understand now that you completely fail to see my point, so I'll just
> > > let it go.
> >
> > Quite honestly, you keep saying this or that change to CSG makes it
> > scarier or more difficult, but I'm still waiting to hear how you would
> > do it.  Why, unlike all other music we list, should typography be
> > limited to latin-128, *especially* if there's a huge built in "if
> > we've not yet made a master list you can just copy/paste over, you can
> > still use generic typography" exception?
>
> > > If you're entire point is that you don't have to use the em-dash
> > > notation if the works list is complete, then you could have just said
> > > so.  I still disagree with it, but you've already lost me past caring
> > > anyway.
> >
> > Please, Lauri, read what I'm saying before you paraphrase me.  This is
> > now the second time you've misquoted me on this.
>
> Funny you object to that, when you're so fast to do it yourself.  I
> didn't misquote you,
> because that was not a quote. I was repeating what I understood you to
> be saying.
> But fair cop, I typed 'use' when I meant 'type'.
>
> Meanwhile, find one place I have ever said to limit things to latin
> script.  You won't,
> because I said no such thing, and didn't even ask for it, nor do I wish it.
> Nor do I keep saying 'this or that' change makes it harder. I am
> saying this one, specific,
> discrete, single change, is nuts. Just this one.
>
> How simply can I put it?
>
> Just because you, personally, cannot type the letter ä without cutting
> and pasting it,
> doesn't mean it makes sense to require a character that NOBODY
> anywhere can type at all.
>
> Just because you think it's fine to cut and paste single characters
> into titles, doesn't
> mean it makes sense, is easy to use, and won't put off other people
> from helping out, when
> the learning curve there is already difficult.
>
> --
> Lauri "clearly I have trouble letting go" Watts
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Musicbrainz-style mailing list
> Musicbrainz-style at lists.musicbrainz.org
> http://lists.musicbrainz.org/mailman/listinfo/musicbrainz-style
>



-- 
Bogdan Butnaru — bogdanb at gmail.com
"I think I am a fallen star, I should wish on myself." – O.