Enhancement suggestion to the current design of 辶 component for TW/HK, and 廴 component for CN/TW/HK

[tamcy]

I know, it's me again. This is about revising, or I'd see it as enhancing, the stroke form of the 辶 and 廴 components in the future. The proposal is to update the component design from this:

To something like this:

There are two main reasons for this suggestion:

1. The current design features a decoration that exists in fonts with flared terminals, and Source Han Sans isn't one of them.
2. The proposed design fits more in a modern typeface like Source Han Sans.

I have prepared the issue details in a PDF file, in presentation format:
proposal.pdf

The PDF explains how the revised design came up by adjustment the current design, why I think this design direction suits better for Source Han Sans, and other information. It also tries to address the concerns some may have. Not sure my argument about the current design (that it has features of flared terminals) is convincing enough; I will try to provide more information when needed.

Here is the list of affected glyphs (edit: added 1 glyph in 2014/10/19)

Thank you for your consideration!

[NightFurySL2001]

I would lean towards agreeing the design, however the current design matches what is used in 纟 and CN/TW/HK 糹 as well as characters with 𠃋 strokes. Characters with 廴 could probably use an update to make it less obvious though.

[tamcy]

I would lean towards agreeing the design, however the current design matches what is used in 纟 and CN/TW/HK 糹 as well as characters with 𠃋 strokes. Characters with 廴 could probably use an update to make it less obvious though.

I believe this has been explained in page 62 - 67 of my proposal?

[NightFurySL2001]

The two questions does not provide the scale of changes that would be required (roughly estimating >=5k glyphs) if implemented while introducing a third angle design to the font (which already is inconsistent enough on itself).

I would suggest to just reduce the flare terminals in 辶 and 廴 to match 𠃋 stroke as it will still be consistent in the design, require less modification and does not require a whole new stroke component.

廴 is in particular problematic in its current design as the positioning is totally incorrect and overly exposes in length.

[tamcy]

I won't directly compare the "㇜" in 去/給 to that of 廴 (also 辶 but just for HK and TW. For brevity I'll just use 廴), because the ending stroke of "㇜" in 去/給 is not horizontal. It's not uncommon for them to be designed differently in a typeface. I'd rather compare it with the "㇜" in 东, 车, 𠃓, 乃, etc.

Still, in Simplified Chinese, "㇋" isn't formed by "㇜". ㇋ itself is a primitive component. In Traditional Chinese, "㇋" is written as two strokes, composed with a "橫鉤" (乛) and a "橫撇" (㇇).

"㇜" forms 东 and 车; while 𠃓 and 乃 are formed by another primitive component "㇡".

So whether or not the "㇜"-alike stroke inside "㇋" should look or be designed the same way as "㇜" can be viewed as a designer's choice.

I think the major concern is that the style of the suggested design looks different from what is currently adopted in Source Han Sans. I agree it does, and this is intentional.

The fact is I don't have access to the source or the component system Adobe uses to design the font. I don't know what the exact effort will be. Maybe Adobe would agree that the font doesn't need flared terminals and decide to remove them in the next iteration? Maybe Adobe would think it's too costly to do so, but still agree that's some issue with the two components, and will find a middle ground? Maybe they would even decide to migrate the components in phases? Or maybe they won't be interested at all? There are just too many possibilities.

So for this one I decided to first boldly propose what I think would be better (I won't say best, but it's the best one I can come up with) for the font, and specify what problem I am trying solve, instead of trying to find a compromise or balance as if I know everything, and potentially regretting the result in the future. Also, I want to use these two components as an opportunity to raise the question of the existence of flared terminals in strokes exclusive to CN/TW/HK.