UBC indic

SR No.: 269719
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Ashok Aklujkar
Publisher: Ashok Aklujkar
Total Pages: 26
Language: English
Classification: Article
File Size: 2 MB

Page 4

UBC INDIC
4
matters, he suggested at that time that I should carry out the further improvement needed for my specific research projects. However, since I was then heavily involved in administrative responsibilities at the university, I did not have the time required to familiarise myself with the Macintosh (I had not directly used any computer until then). On the other hand, I was fortunate to have the help of a good student assistant, Hardeep Khabra, under the 1985 Summer youth employment program of the province of British Columbia. I, therefore, told Hardeep what I needed, and he carried out the changes in Kanchi and Geneva that I suggested. Together we went through about ten revisions of the distribution of Kanchi type fonts on the 3 disk. We also changed the details (curves, knots, etc.) of many fonts to match what I consider to be good Nāgari print. A number of shapes (conjuncts and letters like $, 3, etc.) that could be had some other way were dropped and the space made available by their removal was used to introduce new fonts needed in editing and presenting Indic texts critically. Copies of the disk, called UBC Indic, that resulted from this activity were made available from about June 1985 to February 1986 to several scholars working with Indian languages. Their response, on the whole, was enthusiastically positive.
3. While carrying out these revisions and the ones mentioned in 1.7, I began to appreciate how difficult the work of Āpisali or Panini must have been in an analogous but far more complex situation: rearranging the sounds of the earlier Sanskrit alphabet in the form of the pratyāhāra or Siva sūtras so as to be able to write economical and efficient rules of grammar.