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SILConverters 2.6 (and 2.6.1)
Microsoft Word/COM support for TECkit, CC, and ICU
Updated!
Now includes SIL Converter versions 2.6 and 2.6.1
Overview
Upgrade! New Features
Quick Installation Overview
Downloads
SIL Converters Maps and Tables
Related resources
Contact information
Overview
This package provides tools through which you can change the encoding, font, and/or script of text in Microsoft Word and other Office documents, XML documents, and SFM text and lexicon documents. It also installs a system-wide repository to manage your encoding converters and transliterators (TECkit, 
CC, ICU, Perl, or Python based, as well as support for adding custom transduction engines). For developers, it provides a simple COM interface to select and use a converter from the repository. It is easy to use from VBA, C++, C#, Perl, Python or any .NET/COM enabled language. This package is fully integrated with SIL FieldWorks, AdaptIt, and the forthcoming Speech Analyzer 3.0 and Phonology Assistant 3.0 software, providing the same system-wide registry of installed and available encoding converters for all of these user programs. Additionally the package includes some extra utilities such as a clipboard converter for manipulating text between cut and paste operations.
The following picture illustrates the suite of tools, utilities, and applications that are available and how they interact:
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Figure 1. SIL Converters Suite |
Figure 1 shows the three distinct layers to SIL Converters.
- At the top are various client applications. These user-oriented programs use the EncConverters core assembly to provide encoding conversion and other transduction facilities to their users.
- The EncConverters core provides an abstraction layer so the client applications can access the various transduction engines without having to implement the interface to each one separately.
- The transduction engines are the server applications that provide the actual conversion/text processing capability.
If you are an end user, you are probably most interested in how to use EncConverters with client applications—for example:
- Using the Data Conversion Macro in Microsoft Word to convert the encoding of a document to Unicode, or
- Using Bulk SFM Converter to convert SFM documents into Unicode (typically texts and lexicons from Shoebox to Toolbox)
If you are a developer, you may be interested in
- Using EncConverters to gain access to the different transduction resources available by writing to the single EncConverters’ interface. See this webpage for details and code snippets.
Upgrade! New Features
SILConverters 2.6 corresponds to the same version of the core EncConverters assembly as Fieldworks 4.2 and Speech Analyzer 3.0 and Phonology Assistant 3.0.
The new 2.6.1 version of SILConverters corresponds to the same version of the core EncConverters assembly as Fieldworks 4.9 and 5.0, Speech Analyzer 3.0.1 and early test versions of Phonology Assistant 3.0.
Both versions include the following upgrades to the SILConverters suite (see the SIL Converters 2.6 documentation file for more information):
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Bulk Word Document Converter |
- New Client Applications
- Bulk Word document converter — Use this application to convert one or more Word documents using converters from the system repository. Though it has similar functionality to the Data Conversion Macro, this tool is used outside of the Microsoft Word environment and can be used on multiple documents at the same time. It is also recommended for documents that have very complex formatting, which the Data Conversion Macro occasionally has difficulty converting correctly.
- SILConverters for Office — This Office add-in gives EncConverters support in Microsoft Publisher, Excel, and Access.
Note
This application requires the Microsoft Word Primary Interop Assemblies (PIAs) to be installed. These can only be installed either from your Microsoft Office/Word 2003/2007 CD/DVD or from a 4MB download available from the Microsoft website and only if you have Microsoft Word 2003/2007 installed on your machine.
On some machines, these assemblies will automatically be installed the first time they are requested, so you can try the program first to see if this is the case for your computer. However, if the program crashes, see the FAQ page
here, for details on installing the Office Primary Interop Assemblies via one of the other two methods.
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Discourse Chart builder |
- Discourse Chart Builder — This application helps you prepare discourse analysis charts to study discourse features of a vernacular language text. It uses Adapt It for glossing.
- New Transducers
- AdaptIt Target Word Guesser — This transducer can be used in an Adapt It adaptation project to guess target words based on the Source/Target word pairs in the Adapt It Knowledge Base.
- New Maps & Tables packages containing converters for:
- Cameroon
- Central Africa
- East Africa
- Eastern Congo Group
- West Africa
- Hebrew
- Papua New Guinea
Quick Installation Overview
Note
Please note that the installation procedure for SIL Converters as of version 2.5 is completely different from the old EncCnvtrs.
You will need Administrator privilege on the computer to install this software.
The Master Setup program runs a series of installers:
- Software prerequisites—Necessary system updates and add-ons are installed on your computer.
- SIL Encoding Converters 2.6 Setup—Conversion applications are installed and conversion Maps and Tables are copied to your hard drive.
- SIL Converters for Office 2003—Currently this installer only installs an additional operating system update.
- Converter Installer—A utility that allows you to activate the conversion Maps and Tables you want to use.
Full installation instructions can be found here: SIL Converters 2.6 (and 2.6.1) Installation. This document is intended to guide you through the Master Installer installation screens and initial SIL Converters2.6 Setup. This guide may be sufficient for many users. However, to make full use of SIL Converters 2.6, you should download and refer to the SIL Converters 2.6 Documentation Help (download below).
Downloads
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This document gives installation help. This is the same information that is found here: SIL Converters 2.6 (and 2.6.1) Installation. | |||
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This document gives information about how to use the different utilities and applications for different text transduction applications. This information is no longer available as a webpage. You must download it here. | |||
SIL Converters 2.6.1
Use these installers unless you have FieldWorks 4.2, Speech Analyzer 3.0 or early test versions of Phonology Assistant 3.0. If you have any of these application versions, use the SIL Converteres 2.6 installers, below.
Web installer A live internet connection is required for this installer. |
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| Run SIL Converters 2.6.1 (interactive web-based installer) |
This web installer is recommended for users that only want certain core functionality (e.g. TECkit, CC, and perhaps the Data Conversion Macro) and who do not have a good internet connection. This ‘on-demand’ installer will then only install the components you select; potentially reducing the total download size compared with the other two installer options below. This web installer (you must have a live internet connection!) will lead you through the installation process. If you do not have .NET or other addins it will guide you through installing those as well. Use the Installation Guide to help you through the process. |
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| Offline package-only installer | |||
Size: 14.4 MB MD5 hash: cbaad6b5fb8ab73a6754eb329fea5e5e |
This download is recommended for users that have a fairly good internet connection and want to download an installer that can be run off-line. This is also recommended if you intend to install SILConverters on multiple machines since this link will download the total install set (less required components, such as .Net 2.0—see Standalone installer) , and run setup.exe. There are no specific Installation instructions for this. However, you should find the installation instructions for the web installer helpful: SIL Converters 2.6 (and 2.6.1) Installation |
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Size: 14.4 MB MD5 hash: 988ea34478d5862033cbdb862bb0a2f3 |
This contains the same files as the above . It is provided for those who cannot download an EXE. | ||
| Offline Standalone installer | |||
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Size: 39.4 MB MD5 hash: 286d2caac8fc6b9da131bb8a36f926a9 |
This download is recommended for users that have a very good internet connection and want to download an installer that has all potential prerequisites and can be run off-line. This is also recommended if you intend to install SILConverters on multiple such machines since this link will download the total install set (including all required components). , and run setup.exe. There are no specific Installation instruction for this. However, you should find the installation instructions for the web installer helpful: SIL Converters 2.6 (and 2.6.1) Installation |
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Size: 39.2 MB MD5 hash: 8b813b54a76218705dd268fe9cde1622 |
This contains the same files as the above . It is provided for those who cannot download an EXE. | ||
SIL Converters 2.6
Use this version only if you have FieldWorks 4.2, Speech Analyzer 3.0 or early versions of Phonology Assistant 3.0. Otherwise use 2.6.1, above
Web installer A live internet connection is required for this installer. |
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| Run SIL Converters 2.6 (interactive web-based installer) |
This web installer is recommended for users that only want certain core functionality (e.g. TECkit, CC, and perhaps the Data Conversion Macro) and who do not have a good internet connection. This ‘on-demand’ installer will then only install the components you select; potentially reducing the total download size compared with the other two installer options below. This web installer (you must have a live internet connection!) will lead you through the installation process. If you do not have .NET or other addins it will guide you through installing those as well. Use the Installation Guide to help you through the process. |
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| Offline package-only installer | |||
Size: 15.9 MB MD5 hash: 0d3a630ecaaf54e4f9c5f389d9ec075a |
This download is recommended for users that have a fairly good internet connection and want to download an installer that can be run off-line. This is also recommended if you intend to install SILConverters on multiple machines since this link will download the total install set (less required components, such as .Net 2.0—see Standalone installer) , and run setup.exe. There are no specific Installation instructions for this. However, you should find the installation instructions for the web installer helpful: SIL Converters 2.6 (and 2.6.1) Installation |
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Size: 15.8 MB MD5 hash: 7641a37d659ff76a139fb02fc4d68503 |
This contains the same files as the above . It is provided for those who cannot download an EXE. | ||
| Offline Standalone installer | |||
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Size: 40.9 MB MD5 hash: dafb58b21bc197e036903c7870aaa5d7 |
This download is recommended for users that have a very good internet connection and want to download an installer that has all potential prerequisites and can be run off-line. This is also recommended if you intend to install SILConverters on multiple such machines since this link will download the total install set (including all required components). , and run setup.exe. There are no specific Installation instruction for this. However, you should find the installation instructions for the web installer helpful: SIL Converters 2.6 (and 2.6.1) Installation |
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Size: 40.6 MB MD5 hash: 8dba9215c346820f29277c369ecb2f6f |
This contains the same files as the above . It is provided for those who cannot download an EXE. | ||
| Additional downloads (not part of version 2.6 main package) | |||
| Size: 158 KB | This installer includes the AdaptIt2Unicode converter program which allows you to convert Adapt It Legacy ("Regular") projects to Unicode with converters from the system repository. This installer requires SILConverters 2.6 to be installed. |
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| ConvertText.dot |
Like DataConversion.dot, this contains a Word macro for running converters on Word documents. The user interface is in French (but can also be run in English), and this macro does not delete footnotes and picture objects in a Word document. | ||
Previous versions
The older products are still available for those who require it:
Please note, however, that we strongly recommend using the newer version from this page.
SIL Converters Maps and Tables
This section describes the encodings, font names, and converters contained in the different Maps and Tables packages available in the SILConverters 2.6 installer. You can check below for the fonts/encodings that you are interested in to see which Maps and Tables package to install.
Most end-users are interested only in a small number of encodings. Typically, computer support people have created TECkit maps and/or CC tables for the various encodings used in each entity, alleviating most end-users from having to create their own maps and tables.
Because there are hundreds of possible encoding converters and transliterators that different end-users may be interested in, they are packaged into logically-related groups of converters and are available via a two-step process.
Steps
- Use the SILConverters installer to install the package(s) of converter likely to be useful to you (e.g. based on your entity).
- During installation, all the converter maps/tables in the selected package(s) will be installed into a fixed location on your computer (i.e. C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application ata\SIL\SILConverters22\MapsTables).
- Use the Converter Installer application to install the few applications you want into the EncConverters’ repository.
- They become available to SILConverters client applications.
Note
Installing maps and tables onto your computer with the SILConverters installer (step 1 above) will not make them available to SILConverters client applications unless you explicitly add them to the system repository using the Converter Installer or some other mechanism (see Adding Converters to the System Repository in the Help for SILConverters 2.6 document).
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Optional maps and tables |
The following sections give the details about fonts and encodings for different Maps and Tables packages:
Basic Converters
Converters and Transliterators common to all SIL. This includes the following:
| Converter Name | Encoding Name | Font Names |
| SIL IPA93<>UNICODE | SIL-IPA93-2001 | SILDoulos IPA93 |
| SILManuscript IPA93 | ||
| SILSophia IPA93 | ||
| SIL-IPA-1990<>UNICODE | SIL-IPA-1990 | SILDoulosIPA |
| SILManuscriptIPA | ||
| SILSophiaIPA | ||
| SIL Galatia <>UNICODE | SIL-GREEK_GALATIA-2001 | SIL Galatia |
| ISO-8859<>UNICODE | ISO-8859-1 | |
| AMER PHON>UNICODE | (SIL)-Amer_Phon_SILDoulosL3-(2005) | |
| SIL PUA 3.2<>UNICODE 4.1 | ||
| SIL PUA 3.2<>UNICODE 5.0 | ||
| Symbol<>cp1252 | ||
| UTF8<>UTF16 | ||
| ReverseString | For reversing the bytes of a “narrow” (bytes) string | |
| null | No change to string, but can be used to apply a different font to some text (e.g. in the Data Conversion Macro) | |
| NFC | Convert to normal form composed | |
| NFD | Convert to normal form decomposed |
ICU Transliterators
Configuration information for the following ICU transliterators are for Unicode-encodings only.
These are not the only transliterators available via the ICU Transliterator transduction engine, but are only a few of the pre-defined latinizing (or romanizing) transliterators that can be useful in different client applications for different ranges of Unicode.
- Devanagari to Latin (aka. Devanagari-Latin)
- Bengali to Latin (aka. Bengali-Latin)
- Gujarati to Latin (aka. Gujarati-Latin)
- Gurmukhi to Latin (aka. Gurmukhi-Latin)
- Kannada to Latin (aka. Kannada-Latin)
- Malayalam to Latin (aka. Malayalam-Latin)
- Oriya to Latin (aka. Oriya-Latin)
- Tamil to Latin (aka. Tamil-Latin)
- Telugu to Latin (aka. Telugu-Latin)
- Arabic to Latin (aka. Arabic-Latin)
- Cyrillic to Latin (aka. Cyrillic-Latin)
- Greek to Latin (aka. Greek-Latin)
- Han to Latin (aka. Han-Latin)
- Hangul to Latin (aka. Hangul-Latin)
- Hebrew to Latin (aka. Hebrew-Latin)
- Hiragana to Latin (aka. Hiragana-Latin)
- Katakana to Latin (aka. Katakana-Latin)
- Jamo to Latin (aka. Jamo-Latin)
- NumericPinyin to Latin (aka. NumericPinyin-Latin)
- Any to Latin (aka. Any-Latin)
Note
These transliterators can be daisy-chained together to transliterate between non-Latin scripts using a Compound meta-converter. For example, chaining the Devanagari-Latin transliterator (in the Forward direction) with the Arabic-Latin transliterator (in the Reverse direction) gives a ‘Devanagari-Arabic’ transliterator.
FindPhone to IPA converters
Adds the following converters for dealing with FindPhone encoded data:
- FindPhone>SIL IPA93
- FindPhone>UNICODE
SAG Indic
Contains encoding converter map(s) for the following encoding/font:
| Converter Name | Encoding Name | Font Names |
| Annapurna<>UNICODE | SIL-ANNAPURNA_05-2002 | Annapurna |
| SAG IPA<>UNICODE | SIL-SAG-IPA | SAG-IPA SILDoulos |
| SAG-IPA SILManuscript | ||
| SAG-IPA SILSophia | ||
| SAG IPA Super<>UNICODE | SIL-SAG-IPA_Super | SAG-IPA Super SILCharis |
| SAG-IPA Super SILDoulos | ||
| SAG-IPA Super SILManuscript | ||
| SAG-IPA Super SILSophia | ||
| WinDTS Devanagari<>Unicode | SIL-WinDTS | WinDTS Devanagari |
| TransRoman<>UNICODE | SIL-SAG_TransRoman21-2002 | TransRoman2 Charis |
| TransRoman2 Doulos | ||
| TransRoman2 Manuscript | ||
| TransRoman2 Sophia |
Cameroon
Contains encoding converter map(s) for the following encoding/fonts:
| Converter Name | Encoding Name | Font Names |
| Cameroon <>UNICODE | Cameroon | Cam Cam SILDoulosL |
| Cam Cam SILSophiaL | ||
| Cam Cam SILManuscriptL | ||
| Cam2 Cam2 SILDoulos | ||
| Cam2 Cam2 SILSophia | ||
| Cam2 Cam2 SILManuscript | ||
| Cam Paratext SILDoulos | ||
| Cam Paratext SILSophia | ||
| Cam Paratext SILManuscript |
Central Africa
Contains encoding converter map(s) for the following encoding:
| Converter Name | Encoding Name |
| angb4<>UNICODE | SIL-angb4-2005 |
| MarcelNgbaka<>UNICODE | SIL-MarcelNgbaka-2005 |
East Africa
Contains encoding converter map(s) for the following encoding/fonts:
| Converter Name | Encoding Name | Font Names |
| Times African<>UNICODE | Times African | Times African |
| Bantu Und<>UNICODE | Bantu Und | Bantu Und |
Eastern Congo Group
Contains encoding converter map(s) for the following encoding/fonts:
| Converter Name | Encoding Name |
| Mayogo<>UNICODE | Mayogo |
| Komo<>UNICODE | Komo |
| KomoASCII to Unicode | KomoASCII |
| ECG<>UNICODE | ECG-Unicode(Jan.2005) |
| BuduASCII<>UNICODE | BuduASCII |
| BUDU<>UNICODE | BUDU |
| BheleASCII<>UNICODE | BheleASCII |
West Africa
Contains encoding converter map(s) for the following encoding/fonts:
| Converter Name | Encoding Name |
| SIL-93linb-2005<>UNICODE | SIL-93linb-2005 |
| UBS-Abidjan-2005<>UNICODE | UBS-Abidjan-2005 |
| Bambara SIL Charis<>UNICODE | Bambara SIL Charis |
| SIL-BF Font Family-2005<>UNICODE | SIL-BF_Font_Family-2005 |
| SIL-BF_Times-2006<>UNICODE | SIL-BF_Times-2006 |
| X-SIL-Fulfulde<>UNICODE | X-SIL-Fulfulde |
| SIL-Ghana Doulos-2005<>UNICODE | SIL-Ghana_Doulos-2005 |
| SIL-Mali Standard Font Family<>UNICODE | Mali Standard SILDoulos-2005 |
| RCI Standard Doulos/Sophia/Manuscript<>UNICODE | SIL-RCI Standard-1994 |
| X-SIL-Senufo<>UNICODE | X-SIL-Senufo |
| SIL-Karaboro-2006<>UNICODE | SIL-Karaboro-2006 |
| SIL Samogho Doulos/Sophia/Manuscript<>UNICODE | SIL-Samogho-2006 |
| SIL-Songhai-2006<>UNICODE | SIL-Songhai-2006 |
| Tombouctou-Dutch<>UNICODE | SIL-Tombouctou-Dutch-2006 |
| Burkina Faso Winye-2003<>UNICODE | SIL-Burkina_Winye_Unknown_Font-2005 |
Hebrew
Contains encoding converter map(s) for the following encoding/fonts:
| Converter Name | Encoding Name | Font Names |
| SIL Ezra<>UNICODE | SIL-HEBREW_STANDARD-1997 | SIL Ezra |
| Hebrew Unicode 4.0<>Hebrew Unicode 5.0 | SIL-HEBREW_Unicode_40-2004 | Modifies Unicode Hebrew from 4.0 to 5.0 |
Indic Converters
- Font2Iscii
Note
All of the converters for these fonts are based on the core transducer Font2Iscii available from the website, http://www.iiit.net/ltrc/FC-1.0/fc.html.
If there are problems with these converters, please contact that website for help.
Contains encoding converter map(s) for the following fonts:
| Font Names |
| AkrutiDev1 |
| Ankit |
| Devlys |
| Devpooja |
| Devpriya |
| DVB-TTYogesh |
| DVBW-TTYogesh |
| DV-TTYogesh |
| Kruti46 |
| Mithi |
| Naidunia |
| Roman-Readable |
| Sanskrit-98 |
| Shusha |
| Telugu-Hemalatha |
| Telugu-Hemalathab |
- ITrans
Also available in this package are the ITrans to Unicode converters for the following languages:
| Languages |
| Hindi (e.g. "hindii" converts to हिन्दी) |
| Bengali |
| Gujarati |
| Telegu |
| Tamil |
| Kanada |
| Oriya |
| Malayam |
| Hindi |
| Bengali |
| Gujarati |
| Telegu |
| Tamil |
| Kanada |
| Oriya |
| Malayam |
- UTrans
Also available in this package are the UTrans converters for Unicode presentation form of Urdu (Arabic)
- Himalli
Also available in this package are several converters for these different Himalli encodings:
| Converter Name | Encoding Name | Font Details |
| HimaliNew Devanagari<>UNICODE | Devanagari-HimaliNew | For use with the Himali New font |
| Himallill Devanagari (Mac)<>UNICODE | Devanagari-HimallillMac-1999 | For use with files that use the Mac version of Himallill font |
| Himallill Devanagari (PC 2001)<>UNICODE | Devanagari-HimallillPC-2001 | For use with PC files using the Himallill font named Himallil.ttf, dated 11-Dec-2001 |
| Himalli Devanagari (Mac)<>UNICODE | Devanagari-HimalliMac-1999 | For use with files that use the Mac version of Himalli font |
| Himalli Devanagari (PC 1998)<>UNICODE | Devanagari-HimalliPC-1998 | For use with PC files using the PC Himalli font named himalli.ttf dated 12-May-1998 |
| Himalli Devanagari (PC 2002)<>UNICODE | Devanagari-HimalliPC-2002 | For use with PC files using the PC Himalli font named himalli_.ttf (note underscore) dated 18-Dec-2002 |
- Miscellaneous TECkit Converters
Also available in this package are TECkit converters for miscellaneous Indic encodings:
| Converter Name | Font Name |
| KrutiDev010<>UNICODE | KrutiDev010 |
| KrutiDev290<>UNICODE | KrutiDev290 |
| Kantipur Devanagari<>Unicode | Kantipur |
| Preeti Devanagari<>Unicode | Preeti |
| Tibetan Modern A<>Unicode | Tibetan Modern A |
| UniDevanagri<>UniIPA (phonetic) | Transliteration between Unicode Devanagari and Unicode IPA (phonetic) representation |
Papua New Guinea
Contains encoding converter map(s) for the following encoding/fonts:
| Converter Name | Encoding Name | Font Names |
| SIL PNG<>UNICODE | SIL-PNG_Fonts-1998 | PNG SILCharis |
| PNG SILDoulos | ||
| PNG SILManuscript | ||
| PNG SILSophia Lit | ||
| PNG SILCharis Lit | ||
| PNG SILSophia CQLit |
NLCI (India)
Contains encoding converter map(s) for the following encoding/font:
| Converter Name | Encoding Name | Font Names |
| SL Oriya<>UNICODE | NLCI-SLOriya | |
| Winscript/iLeap Devanagari<>UNICODE | CDAC-ISFOC_DEVANAGARI | DEV Panini |
| DV-TTYogesh | ||
| Winscript/iLeap Gujarati<>UNICODE | CDAC-ISFOC_GUJARATI | GUJ Gir |
| Winscript Malayalam<>UNICODE | NLCI-Malayalam | MAL Vayalar |
| Winscript Oriya<>UNICODE | NLCI-Oriya | ORI Asika |
| Winscript Tamil<>UNICODE | NLCI-Tamil | TAM Thiruvalluvar |
| Winscript Telugu<>UNICODE | NLCI-Telugu | TEL Nirmal |
Related resources
Encoding Conversion Frequently Asked Questions and Known IssuesFrequently Asked Questions and Known Issues concerning conversion of legacy data to Unicode.
SIL IPA93 Data ConversionStep-by-step instructions on how to convert Microsoft Word, text or Standard Format (sfm) documents that use SIL IPA93 fonts in order to use Unicode fonts.
To compose or decompose, that is the questionIn our workflow, should we standardize on composed (e.g., NFC) or decomposed (e.g., NFD) character encoding for our Unicode data?
Contact information
Contact 
mailto:silconverters_support@sil.org for limited support.
© 2003-2009 SIL International, all rights reserved, unless otherwise noted elsewhere on this page.
Provided by SIL's Non-Roman Script Initiative. Contact us at nrsi@sil.org.