just a note to see if double-byte characters (such as you get using the microsoft IME for Japanese) are on the horizon for Touch?
I find it hard to recommend Touch to Japanese users otherwise as Japanese is such a visually rich thing to display, it’s hard for a designer to go without text!
Rod.
Hi Rodney,
Where would you expect to see double-byte codes - in the Text TOP? What would be the minimum UI - I would think that entering num ber codes for acharacters would be insufficient. Would converting to-from a text editor that was Japanese-English suffice?
yes, I think it would be okay if it was done in the text editor. of course it would be nice to be able to type directly into a DAT from the windows IME (今日ã¯ã€å®œã—ã ãŠé¡˜ã—ã¾ã™ï¼ï¼‰
even to be able to paste stuff in from somewhere else would be great.
I think that, when you set windows to use both English and Japanese, it puts in two extra fonts: MS Gothic and MS Mincho as defaults for Japanese text until you find other fonts.
I can ask Marina to do some tests when you’re ready. She got fairly dapper with Touch during the 4 weeks I was over there. I remember Ted was itching to get some Japanese text flying around in Touch. Is he still about?
Rod.
If you could put and edit the Japanese (or other unicode) text in a file via a NotePad or WordPad, you are part way there.
A Text DAT can be used as the text source for the Text TOP. The Text DAT can point to that file, and the Reload File button parameter can be pressed to load the text into the Text DAT. (and subsequently you can edit the text in your external editor)
So Touch would need to read the byte sequence in the .txt file into the Text DAT intact, which it is not doing - perhaps it’s eliminating non-printable characters.
Then Tiych needs to allow the Text TOP to correctly interpret the bytes in the Text DAT as unicode and display the correct character, assuming MS Mincho or similar is the font, which we also don’t do yet.
So even if the Text DAT contains the right bytes and is not displaying it, if you can edit it in some windows application, you can get what you want to the Text TOP. Is that adequate? That doesn’t cover entering text in Field components, which is more difficult.
did anyone get any further with this?
being able to load japanese text from a DAT after editing in some other program would be a start. now we have a few more Touch users in Japan (not just Tetsu and Noboru-sensei), this will become more important.
of course, double-byte characters in the text fields would be the goal but this would at least make it usable.
and the characters are so graphically interesting even if you can’t read them!
Rodney
Kanji catching on all over, but frequently misunderstood
japantoday.com/category/top- … understood
It’ funny to see so many stupid Japanese characters on T-shirts when I go abroad.
Something like this (Imagine ya’ll in North America wear it without English translation)
upsold.com/dshop/store.php/s … tag/STUPID
I guess Japanese characters (incl. Kanji/Hiragana/Katakana for boom as a important part of our subcultures like anime/manga/moe/kawaii etc…
BTW, Unicode/UTF-8 support would be the minimum requirements for all over the world.
In my humble undestanding, Unicode is a whole universe of characters all over the world and UTF-8 is an address to each characters.
Unicode List
tamasoft.co.jp/ja/general-info/unicode.html
Other than the Kanji iput method issue, I met a small issue when I first copy .toe files (gift from Tetsu) on the desktop （in Japanese WindowsXP, デスクトップ）, I could not open it in a right way.
We Japanese have to name all files and directories in English characters and put them under c: directory to use in TD077 FTE environment.
It’s not a big issue for instance but “IS” for new comers.
They will say good bye to TD FTE and would never come back again.
I know what rodberry means in his yelling.
just determined to bump this every 7 months or so. 
even if not supported in the UI as such, it would be still sexy to be able to bring in double-byte stuff from text files or via sockets etc. and have the font SOP and Text TOP display them.
bumpity bumpity bump… ba bumpapabump…
Rodney
With sunlight steady darkening in this west, we might consider rotating our heads eastwards as to fully absorb the savior rays of the rising Sun.
Nothing specific to say in this post, I just don’t want Rodney to feel like the lonely bumper.
one more bump for double-byte support. i need chinese in touchdesigner!
Any Japanese users still there? Noboru-sensei? Ted?
I think this is one of the things holding TouchDesigner back from being a hell motion-graphics platform - especially in interactive contexts.
I agree that support for UTF-8 would be greatly beneficial, and not only for motion graphics, but for everything text-based in TD.
[size=150]よろしくお願いします!! m(_ _)m [/size]
Your prayers have been answered! [url]Unicode Text DLL TOP - Shared .tox Components - TouchDesigner forum