"嘅(U+5605)" is not consistent with other words with the same phonetic component (T Chinese)

[tamcy]

This issue has been reported in Google's issue tracker, but I've read from Adobe CJK Type Blog's Twitter that it'd be better to report the NotoSansCJK issues in this Github for better tracking, so I include the original link with a brief summary here.

Same issue in Google's issue tracker: https://code.google.com/p/noto/issues/detail?id=70

This issue is about the representation of "嘅" in the Traditional Chinese version of the font.

• "嘅(U+5605)" is what we call a "phono-semantic compound" where "口" is the radical and "既" is the phonetic component. So 嘅 = 口 + 既. Similar words are 溉, 概, 慨, 暨.
• There are a couple of variants of "既", e.g. U+65E2(既), U+65E3(旣) and U+FA42(既).
• It makes sense for a font to use the same writing form for all words using the same phonetic component.

• The first form in the above screenshot, 既, is chosen by Taiwan Ministry of Education as the standard. As a result, we see 溉 = 氵+ 既, 概 = 木+既, 慨 = 忄+既.... etc. in the Traditional Chinese font. This is correct.
• However, "嘅" is the an exception: It is rendered as "口旣", not "口既".

• According to the conversation in Google's issue tracker, this inconsistency is probably caused by some strange decision made in CNS-11643. So the font is actually behaving correctly according to this standard. However, the point is that this is an irrational decision because it breaks consistency.
• Practically, 嘅 is rarely used in Taiwan (it isn't even in the Big5 table). But it is frequently used in Cantonese speaking community like Hong Kong.

I would like to know if this word can be specially treated so that we HK user won't see different form for the same component. This should have no impact to non-Cantonese speaking community like TW because 嘅 is an obsolete or dead word to them. And this doesn't involve redrawing the glyph, because the glyph "口既" in Simplified Chinese version is exactly what I am looking for.

Thank you!

[extc]

The issue in Google Code should be 38.
https://code.google.com/p/noto/issues/detail?id=38

The shape shown in the Unihan database is

http://www.unicode.org/cgi-bin/GetUnihanData.pl?codepoint=5605

Therefore, for Source Han Sans TWHK, the shape should refer to the Adobe-CNS1-6 PDF file. The glyph is CID16002. The display font is AdobeMingStd-Light. It follows the modern shape, that is 口既.

[kenlunde]

My apologies for taking so long to reply to this issue. I was away for four days.

Anyway, your findings, especially when referencing AdobeMingStd-Light, suggest that the current Simplified Chinese glyph for U+5605, uni5605-CN (CID+13199), can be used for Traditional Chinese.

[kenlunde]

I am closing this Issue, and have opened Issue #48 to indicate the action that is planned to address the concerns. Please feel free to continue posting to this issue if appropriate.

[kenlunde]

Fixed in Version 1.001.