[Avodah] Defining an Os

[Micha Berger]

We got to the topic of making an electronic device display a new
text, and whether or not it's kesivah...

As already discussed here, on an e-ink page (e.g. a Kindle) the image is
theoretically permanent (well more than 3 days), it's only the screensaver
software that erases it.

Also possibly relevent is whether one can use silk-screening to
write a sefer Torah, or if kesivah de'Oraisa requires drawing
each letter individually. Or perhaps "kesivah" has different
limits in each context.

But RMYG offered a new idea we haven't bounced around here before:
: R' ZS:
:> <SNIP>but I'm puzzled as to how one could arrange
:> to scroll or turn the page without koseiv, probably d'oraisa, but at
:> least d'rabbonon.

: Using a "broken" font? (Where the letters have gaps in them, thus not doing
: a full Ois.)

First piece:
An employer used to give each employee a PalmPilot as a welcome aboard
gift. In those days, the input mechanism was to use a stylus to draw
each letter in something called "Graffiti". For many letters, Graffiti
was like normal writing, but for any letter that required lifting the
pen betwen strokes, they modified the letter down to something you would
do without lifting the stylus. E.g. "A" was an upside-down V, and "T"
was more like a "7".

Pretty soon fonts came out in Graffiti, so that Palm related web sites
(and Palm owners with an intense product loyalty) can disply text
accordingly. What was an almost-alphabet became a script in its own
right, at least among this small population.

Second piece:
Hebrew has hei and qof which are two piece letters; in script, there is
also alef. (In most variants; I learned to draw something more like a "K"
with curvy side-arms.) A letter can be in two pieces and still be an os.

Putting the pieces together:
How commonplace does this new font RMYG proposes have to become before
it becomes a script in its own right -- a set of non-broken but two-piece
osios?

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Man is equipped with such far-reaching vision,
micha at aishdas.org        yet the smallest coin can obstruct his view.
http://www.aishdas.org                         - Rav Yisrael Salanter
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