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Short URL: https://scripts.sil.org/SILFred

Friendly Right-to-Left Editor (FRED)

NRSI staff, 1999-08-27

Ezra and Unicode

This SIL Hebrew Font System is a pre-Unicode or “legacy” font system. It provides a means of working with biblical Hebrew texts in an encoding created by SIL in 1995. These fonts are superceded by Unicode-encoded Hebrew fonts, such as Ezra SIL.

The transliteration fonts in this package were made obsolete with the advent of Latin Unicode fonts, available with any newer OS. Only a keyboard is helpful (not required) for typing Hebrew transliteration. See last item in Ezra SIL package or Hebrew-Greek Transliteration Unicode Keyboard for Macintosh for two examples.

Use of the SIL Hebrew Font System is enhanced by this Windows utility for typing right-to-left. It only works with the SIL Ezra Hebrew font (obsolete).

FRED simplifies typing with the SIL Ezra font (only) by allowing the user to view text right-to-left as it is typed in a small window. It can then be cut and pasted to any Windows text window. It is therefore not required to use Microsoft Word 6.0 and the Reverse macro when using the SIL Ezra font.

The download file (SILFRED1.EXE) is a self-extracting archive. After the download is complete, use File Manager or Explorer to select the drive icon where the SILFRED1.EXE file is located. Find SILFRED1.EXE in the directory window and double-click on it. This will extract the files to the current directory. (In the Windows 3.1 File Manager you may need to press F5 to update the directory screen).

SIL Fred's Right-to-Left Editor (self-extracting archive)
NRSI staff, 1999-08-27
Download "SILFRED1.EXE", Windows application, 231KB [17239 downloads]

No documentation is provided with this utility.

User Instructions:

Do not attempt to edit words using the cursor keys in the Fred window.
You MUST use the provided Keyman keyboards with FRED for proper alignment of points, etc.
FRED only works with the SIL Ezra font. It will not display in any other font.
This software is provided as freeware, with no warranties or guarantees inherent in its use.

Known Incompatibilities:

Windows 98 OS: Do not hit the return or enter key when typing in the FRED window. This causes FRED to disappear and you will not be able to type in any window. The mouse will still be working however. To clear this problem, completely exit from KeyMan. You may then re-open both Keyman and FRED and continue.

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