[Indic-computing-standards] ISFOC - is it a bird, is it a plane ...

[<al...@ya...>]

Hi,
What is ISFOC?
Is it a font encoding standard, or a script rendering engine, or "something
else"? To what extent can it be and has it been used for standardization of
font and/or character encodings as the case may be?

Here's some information I tried to collect, it confused me more than before ~~
I'm sure the gurus here would be able to derive what it is via this
information.


http://www.cdacindia.com/html/gist/standard/isfoc.asp
<snip>
character-slice(glyph) coding standards to ensure good appearance and
aesthetics for which Indian scripts are famous for. Unlike ISCII, these code
charts are different for each script and are represented in 8-bits only. They
are suitable for all GUI environments requiring bit-map fonts, Type-1 fonts or
True Type fonts.
</snip>
I understand that ISFOC is a font encoding standard? If yes, does anyone have
the "code charts" for this 8 bit font encoding standard? Surprisingly, they are
not available at the official site.
If it is not a font encoding standard, what is it?
This page doesn't even mention the full form of ISFOC(if it has any). 

http://www.studio-systems.com/broadfeatures/JulyAug2001/CDAC/29.htm

<snip>
Converters are components that are needed to supply the rendering engine with
the display codes (ISFOC) from the storage codes (ISCII) and vice versa.
Converters are language specific mapping tables along with algorithms to
generate display strings for the output device.
</snip>
implies that ISCII, being a character encoding, needs ISFOC for rendering.

http://www.lingua-uk.com/cdac.htm
gives the full form(Indian Script Font Code) though I'm not very sure it is
correct, since it hasn't come from an official source.
<snip>
# ISFOC Script Manager makes it possible to harness the strength of MS-Windows
or Macintosh based powerful packages like Corel Draw , Quark Xpress , 3D Studio
, MS-Excel , Power Point, Page Maker, MS-Word etc.
# To ensure appealing usage of Indian Scripts, CDAC has ushered in the "ISFOC"
(Indian Script Font Code) standard that do justice to the nature of script
while conforming to the normal requirements .
</snip>
seems to imply that ISFOC is a "something" that is used to display indic fonts
on win*.

http://www.cfilt.iitb.ac.in/resourcepage/
has a "Download Monollingual ISFOC to Billingual ISFOC Converter" link.


http://mail.gnome.org/archives/gtk-i18n-list/2000-November/msg00020.html
says that it is a 
"it doesn't count as a standard unless it is freely redistributable."
meaning, it is supposed to be a standard of some sort, but nobody really
*knows* what that standard is.

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