Preliminary study on Sinhalese Document Styles (with the discussions in Sri Lanka)

2004-01-24
Y. Komachi/CICC

Some DocSii members in CICC had studied Sinhalese documents and found some interesting formatting objects. They should be clarified to be regular or irregular formatting styles from the native experts' point of view.

The comments provided by Sri Lankan experts are added to this document. They are shown with indentation and yellow background in such a style as this paragraph.

1. Table of contents

Some items indicate a range of pages, e.g., 4 - 5.

It is a usual formatting.

Example No.01

2. Line position in an adjacent column

In some lines, line positions are not aligned with those of corresponding lines in an adjacent column.

Being based on hand-written documents' formatting

Example No.02

Example No.03

3. Left/right alignment

3.1 Right alignment

Example No.04 shows a right alignment of the right column. Is it a regular formatting in Sinhalese documents?

It is an unusual formatting.

Example No.04

3.2 Left/right combined alignment

In a single column left and right alignments are combined. We can sometimes see such a formatting in Sinhalese documents.

Formatting for a poetry.

Example No.05

4. Drop cap

4.1 Inverted drop cap

Usual formatting

Example No.06

Example No.07

4.2 Ordinary drop cap

Usual formatting

Example No.08

5. List

5.1 Unordered list

Special bullets are employed in unordered lists.

Usual formatting

Example No.09

Example No.10

Example No.11 shows a large indentation in a nested unordered list.

Example No.11

5.2 Ordered list

Indentation is applied only to the first line of each list item of an ordered list.

Usual formatting

Example No.12

6. Rounded enclosure

Rounded enclosures are frequently employed.

Usual formatting

Example No.13

Example No.14

7. Underline

An underline touches no characters.

Usual formatting

Example No.15

An underline touches some characters of a corresponding character string.

Usual formatting

Example No.16

Example No.17

8. Punctuation mark

8.1 Leader

3 dots or 4 dots leaders are employed frequently at the end of articles.

Usual formatting

Example No.18

Example No.19

Example No.20

Multiple dots leaders are sometimes employed. What is the meaning of the multiple dots leader just before a character?

Usual formatting. A multiple dots leader just before a character means a continuation. Example 21 shows a poetry formatting.

Example No.21

Example No.22

8.2 Combination of colon and dash

A combination of colon and dash are frequently used in Sinhalese documents. What is the meaning of the combination?

Usual formatting. Its meaning is identical to ":".

Example No.23

Example No.24

8.3 Parenthesis

Some parentheses touch their adjacent characters. Is the font inappropriate?

The touching is due to an inappropriate font.

Example No.25

Example No.26