Path: utzoo!yunexus!geac!daveb From: daveb@geac.UUCP (David Collier-Brown) Newsgroups: comp.std.c Subject: Re: Trigraphs. Summary: What was the origin, please? Message-ID: <2826@geac.UUCP> Date: 8 Jun 88 12:23:52 GMT Article-I.D.: geac.2826 References: <19345@watmath.waterloo.edu> Reply-To: daveb@geac.UUCP (David Collier-Brown) Distribution: comp Organization: The Geac "Huh?" Department Lines: 33 In article <19345@watmath.waterloo.edu> rbutterworth@watmath.waterloo.edu (Ray Butterworth) writes: | Let's consider the various combinations of compilers and terminals. | Commonly, either of these can be US-ASCII, 7-bit French-ASCII (or | some other national character set), or 8-bit IS0-ASCII. [ case analysis elided] | That reduces the cases that need trigraphs to those that have | French-ASCII terminals and that also prefer to avoid using the | national keys. | Consider that at the moment trigraphs don't even exist outside | the minds of the X3J11 Committee, and decide how many people | that now use the funny characters and are going to switch to | using trigraphs. Ok, can someone quote the approximate reasoning behind the consideration of trigraphs? As Ray has made a good case against the problem's existance, I therefor wonder 1) if some "outside" body has dictated that the standard committee "solve" it[1] or 2) if the committee merely misestimated the significance of the problem. --dave c-b [1] Suggested without proof earlier in the discussion, source not recorded. -- David Collier-Brown. {mnetor yunexus utgpu}!geac!daveb Geac Computers Ltd., | "His Majesty made you a major 350 Steelcase Road, | because he believed you would Markham, Ontario. | know when not to obey his orders"