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padding:0 0 0 25; height:36px; margin:0; color:#FFFFFF;"> Computers & Writing Systems </div> <div style="padding:0 0 0 0; background-color:#000000; color:#FFFFFF"> <table width='100%'> <tr> <td style="padding: 0 0 0 25px"><a class="GlobalNavLink" href="http://www.sil.org/">SIL HOME</a> | <a class="GlobalNavLink" href="https://software.sil.org/products/">SIL SOFTWARE</a> | <a class="GlobalNavLink" href="/support.html">SUPPORT</a> | <a class="GlobalNavLink" href="https://www.givedirect.org/donate/?cid=13536">DONATE</a> | <a class="GlobalNavLink" href="/privacy-policy.html">PRIVACY POLICY</a> </td> <td align='right' width='20%'> <script async src="https://cse.google.com/cse.js?cx=0760bf09a6bff4b0c"></script><style>.gsc-control-cse {padding: 0.6em; min-width: 10em; width: 18em; max-width: 20em} form.gsc-search-box {display: unset;}</style><div class="gcse-search"></div> </td> </tr> </table> </div> <div style="padding:0 25 25 25"> You are here: <a class='CategoryPath' href='/cms/scripts/page.php%3Fid%3Dencoding%26site_id%3Dnrsi.html'>Encoding</a> > <a class='CategoryPath' href='/cms/scripts/page.php%3Fid%3Dunicode%26site_id%3Dnrsi.html'>Unicode</a> Short URL: <a href='/charstories_0140.html'>https://scripts.sil.org/CharStories_0140</a>   <h1>Character Stories: U+013F, U+0140 Latin Capital / Small L with Middle Dot </h1> Peter Constable, 2004-04-16[Source: Eric Muller, Unicode list, 2002-8-6] U+0140 LATIN SMALL LETTER L WITH MIDDLE DOT is intended to be used in Catalan (‘ŀl’ is pronounced as two separate ‘l’ while ‘ll’ is pronounced as in ‘million’). However... everybody seems to use U+006C U+00B7 U+006C. [Source: Ken Whistler, Unicode list, 2002-8-6] There is no particular reason to use the l· as a single character, when all the 8859-based and Windows 1252 implementations would be using U+00B7 for the middle dot. Consider U+0140 as effectively a compatibility character for ISO 6937. It is mapped to 0xF7 in that standard. It is also mapped to 0xA9A8 in Code Page 949 (Korean) — which probably got it from ISO 6937 in the first place. [Source: Ken Whistler, Unicode list, 2004-4-15, edited] It should be noted that there is a decomposition for U+0140 in the Unicode Character Database... It is a compatibility decomposition for two reasons: the decomposition into the sequence <006C, 00B7> may result in rendering differences (both because of potentially different decisions about where the render the dot and because the introduction of the U+00B7 <img src='/cms/sites/nrsi/media/usv/0080-00FF.0.12pt.png' border='0' style='position: absolute; left: -88px; top: -84px;'> MIDDLE DOT might impact line break decisions, depending on the implementation); secondly, the properties of the characters in the sequence <006C, 00B7> are distinct from those for <0140> by itself, and may impact things such as identifier parsing, again, depending on an implementation. And, as I indicated before, U+0140 is itself basically a compatibility character, introduced for mapping to ISO 6937, a preexisting standard that was among the list of character encoding standards intended to be covered by the initial Unicode repertoire. [Source: Anto'nio Martins-Tuva'lkin, Unicode list, 2004-3-26, edited] Catalan usual orthography uses a regular middle dot to separate two “L”s in those cases where they are pronounced as a single one, doubled only for etymological reasons. This dot is not connected to the previous "L" in any way, as if it were some kind of diacritical. It is a standalone character — akin to the hyphen in French or Portuguese... I advise removal of the note “Catalan” under U+0140 and U+013F, and perhaps replacement of the whole note with «for Catalan use U+006C U+00B7» (respectively, U+004C). <hr clear='all'>Note: the opinions expressed in submitted contributions below do not necessarily reflect the opinions of our website.<hr> <hr> © 2003-2024 <a href='http://www.sil.org/' target='_blank'>SIL International</a>, all rights reserved, unless otherwise noted elsewhere on this page. Provided by SIL's Writing Systems Technology team (formerly known as NRSI). 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