CJKV Information Processing, 2nd Edition

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CHAPTER 3

Character Set Standards

I must rst state that achieving a rock-solid understanding of and a deep appreciation for

CJKV character set standards—what character classes they include, how many characters

they enumerate, how they evolved, which ones are in common use, and so on—forms the

foundation on which the remainder of this book is based. Without such a basic under-

standing, it would be pointless to discuss topics such as encoding methods, input meth-

ods, font formats, and typography. is chapter thus represents what I consider to be the

core or absolutely essential material of this book.

Note that all CJKV character sets can be classied into two basic types, depending on

their intended purpose and reason for establishment:

Noncoded Character Sets—NCSes•

Coded Character Sets—CCSes•

For clarication, noncoded refers to a character set established without regard to how it

would be processed on computer systems, if at all, and coded refers to being electronically

encoded or computerized. In other words, coded character sets were specically designed

for processing on computer systems. You will soon realize that the characters enumer-

ated in NCSes generally constitute a subset of the characters contained in CCSes, and

aect their development. And, to some extent, CCSes can even aect the development of

NCSes.

In reading this chapter, I am condent that you will develop a ...