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On 04/14/2012 12:30 PM, Mike Hart wrote:
<blockquote
cite="mid:1334442603.14033.YahooMailNeo@web161206.mail.bf1.yahoo.com"
type="cite">
<div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255,
255); font-family: times new roman,new york,times,serif;
font-size: 12pt;">...<br>
<div><span>I've lately seen in some online help menus and
peripheral documentation that Paratext 7.3 will support a
newer version of USFM. The latest is 2.35 but it's changed
multiple times in the last couple months, and as far as I
know 7.3 isn't out yet. 2.35 appears to be a full and final
release, but... I'd wait until Paratext 7.3 is released.
Our group isn't in the core of Paratext development, so
we're slow to get updates. I think we are on the latest
stable release 7.2.163.0, but 7.3 may already be out and we
aren't on it yet. The point is that USFM is apparently
under revision. Most of the changes are designed to support
a richer paper bible experience (Study Bible sidebars
defined in the same project file as the Bible) and to
further separate the translation process from paper markup
(deprecating tags for emphasised, small caps, etc, more
emphasis on using meaning filled tags like 'words of God',
etc.) Since things are being deprecated, it's worth
reviewing the USFM 2.35 spec ( or the latest once 7.3 IS
released) before embarking on a redo project of the
USFM2OSIS script.</span></div>
</div>
</blockquote>
<br>
USFM has been evolving slowly, but has mostly been in a very
backward-compatible way, with just a few additional tags being
added. There is one very significant change on the horizon that
isn't yet documented, and that is support for overlapping character
styles. For example, a future release of Paratext will support USFM
markup like "\wj xxxxx \add xxxx\add* xxxx\wj*".<br>
<br>
<br>
<blockquote
cite="mid:1334442603.14033.YahooMailNeo@web161206.mail.bf1.yahoo.com"
type="cite">
<div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255,
255); font-family: times new roman,new york,times,serif;
font-size: 12pt;">
<div><span><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://paratext.ubs-translations.org/about/usfm">http://paratext.ubs-translations.org/about/usfm</a> <br>
</span></div>
<div><span><br>
</span></div>
<div><span>(the "documentation" section about 70% down the page)<br>
</span></div>
<div><span><br>
</span></div>
<div><span>Draft USFM Stylesheets <br>
</span></div>
<div><span><br>
</span></div>
<div><span>You might also consider that the stylesheets
available on that page contain style definitions for the
USFM tagging system in it's entirety in a heirarchial form
(as far as I know it's complete.) That is, The stylesheet is
probably vastly more useful than the documentation for
someone attempting an USFM2OSIS or USFM2anything script from
scratch, or for maintaining a script..... <br>
</span></div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>---<br>
<span></span><span></span><span><br>
</span></div>
<div><span>After reviewing today, apparently my words
"deprecated tags" have been lessened from an earlier draft
copy (2.33?) I last reviewed to a 'strong recommendation
against' the use of hard character styling. Apparently it
is the direction USFM is going, but they slowed down the
train.<br>
</span></div>
<div><span class="tab"><br>
</span></div>
<div><span class="tab"></span><span class="tab"></span><span><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://ubs-icap.org/chm/usfm/2.35/special_text_character_styles.htm">http://ubs-icap.org/chm/usfm/2.35/special_text_character_styles.htm</a></span></div>
</div>
</blockquote>
<br>
I suspect that support for these hard character styles will never
fully go away, and I hope they don't. Indeed, I will keep supporting
them in my software even if Paratext doesn't. The reason is that I
have seen cases in real translations where there simply is not a tag
that actually means what the translator intended by using such
styles. In some cases, there might be an equivalent, but the work of
figuring out what it should be is just too hard, especially in the
case of translators who have already gone home to be with Jesus. You
could probably argue that some translators made bad choices in
assigning meanings to certain forms of markup. You could also argue
that some translators made bad choices in terms of selecting
characters for writing their languages. In some cases, you might be
right, but it is still too late to change any of these things. Thus,
idealism must yield to humility and pragmatism wins out over purity
of markup theories.<br>
<br>
<blockquote
cite="mid:1334442603.14033.YahooMailNeo@web161206.mail.bf1.yahoo.com"
type="cite">
<div style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: rgb(255, 255,
255); font-family: times new roman,new york,times,serif;
font-size: 12pt;">Latest USFM Manual <br>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>I note that the Crosswire wiki has a nonworking link for
latest USFM. This might be the best replacement:</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://ubs-icap.org/chm/usfm/">http://ubs-icap.org/chm/usfm/</a><br>
</div>
</div>
</blockquote>
<br>
UBS gave me this stable link: <a href="http://ubs-icap.org/usfm">http://ubs-icap.org/usfm</a>,
which generally redirects somewhere that you can find the latest
USFM documentation in CHM, HTML, downloadable HTML, and PDF formats.<br>
<br>
USX documentation should be coming from UBS, soon. In the mean time,
Paratext can generate samples of it if you have access to Paratext.<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
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