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On Sun, 22 Feb 2009 14:03:56 -0700, Khaled Hosny
I totally agree with you, more ever I hop that at some point in the future, just selecting certain language will be enough to get proper display of it, some thing like:
\mainlanguage[arabic] \startext أهلا بالعالم! \stoptext
Fonts will always be complicated... for what you are describing we need to start with a default Arabic-script font for TeX, like LM for Latin. My suggestion is to make Scheherazade that font, since it is free, distributable, and supports nearly all Arabic script languages. We could make two settings: one for Scheherazade as the LM fallback for the needed Ar-script ranges for unicode, another for Scheherazade as the main font, with Termes as Latin fallback. That will give us a benchmark from which to proceed with other fonts. If I get time I'll try to build typescripts etc for this scenario, or Khaled or someone else can take on this task, and I'll review it. Even Scheherazade has lots of options, and it will take some research to get the "ideal" default even here. Best wishes Idris -- Professor Idris Samawi Hamid, Editor-in-Chief International Journal of Shi`i Studies Department of Philosophy Colorado State University Fort Collins, CO 80523