VNI Tan Ky
for Mac O/S 8.x to 9.2

Vietnamese text by: Le Dinh Nhat Lang
English translation by: Nguyen Tam

Good news for users who love Vietnamese and computers: VNI Software Company has recently introduced its new Vietnamese software product for Mac OS.:

VNI Tan Ky for Macintosh & Power Macintosh helps users to type Vietnamese in most of the application software running on Macintosh and Power Macintosh such as Word, WordPerfect, PageMaker, QuarkXPress, Illustrator, Excel, etc..

VNI Tan Ky for Mac offers similar functionality and features as in VNI Tan Ky for Windows. They include VNI Tan Ky typing method, auto-correction, many more fonts, better font quality for the professionals in publishing and newspaper, simplicity and user-friendly.

One of the most interesting features offered by VNI Tan Ky for Macintosh and Power Macintosh is that it allows full interchangeability between Mac and PC users.

It is a significant enhancement for the Vietnamese people abroad who nowadays have been trying to incorporate Vietnamese language into the World Wide Web.

This article is intended to further discuss this issue but first, let evaluate the new features and enhancements offered by VNI Tan Ky for Macintosh and Power Macintosh:

° Fast and easy typing method

With VNI Tan Ky typing method, accent marks can be placed anywhere in the syllable. The accent marks will be correctly placed above the intended vowels. In some instances, auto-correction feature of the software will also enforce the spelling.

The following example will further describe the auto-correction feature in details. When typing the syllable "toan", the accent mark " " is misplaced on the "o". Upon finishing, the accent mark "huyen" will be automatically placed on "a" for correct spelling. (Afterward, if "^" is entered, the vowel "o" will change to "u", thus conforming to conventional spelling to make "tuaàn").

Besides auto-correcting misspelling, VNI Tan Ky also provides another unique feature which allows you to select and set your own spelling rules to conform to your special needs, particularly if you are working in a newspaper or publishing environment.

For example, you can preset the placement for certain accents to "oa", "oe", or "uy" sound; or whether to change all "y" to "i" in the syllables such as "lí trí" and "hi vong"; and many other options. Once the rules are set, they will be applied throughout your document for a uniformed spelling standard.

In addition, VNI Tan Ky offers another new and unique method called "Toc Ky" (or macro typing) which helps to simplify the typing of a long string of characters and enhance your typing speed. For example: simplified form of "tp" will be translated into "thanh pho", "nxb" is "nha xuat ban", or "vtth" is "vo tuyen truyen hinh), etc..

You have the complete control over what rules to follow or what definitions to set.

It allows you to change the definition of each character on the keyboard such as "w" to "u", "f" to "ph", etc.. or you may also rearrange the accent keys to conform to any existing Vietnamese typing method.

Toc Ky can also be used to define macros for other languages, that are not compatible with U.S. standard keyboard, such as French or Spanish, etc..

° Re-use all of other Vietnamese fonts

Beside providing you the ultimate tool for the fast, easy and correct Vietnamese typing, VNI Tan Ky for Mac also supports all of other Vietnamese character and font sets such as VN Classic, Thin Art, VPS, etc.. You only need to select the character set with the associated fonts to use in VNI Tan Ky with similar comfort.

This software package offers 33 different TrueType and 33 PostScript fonts which are more than adequate for personal use. Other fonts for publishing and printing will be available in the next upgrade.

In addition to the artistic look applauded by professional publishers and printing shops, VNI fonts are based entirely on state-of-the-art character sets compared to others. First, each font offers both lower case and upper case for the same font. This feature helps you to eliminate the need to switch to another font for all upper case typing or vice versa.

Secondly, after choosing a font set, you may change to all upper case or first-letter only effortlessly as in English and vice versa. With non-VNI fonts, such capability is often unavailable. Either only one-way switch or limited switching capability is permitted.

Another unique feature of VNI Tan Ky for Mac is to support case sensitive search. This feature is useful when searching for a mixed case syllable in MS/Word, FileMaker Pro or Claris Works.

° PC/Mac interchangeability

Another feature of VNI font is the full PC/Mac interchangeability. It allows file open one to another if using the same fonts.

VNI Software has announced that a total of 120 fonts for Mac OS will be available to make it fully interchangeable with PC.

If VNI Tan Ky has been installed on both the PC and Macintosh with similar font sets, document prepared under PC running Windows can be opened for edit by Mac or vice versa without additional software, font sets, or conversion.

For example, a WinWord document prepared on PC using VNI fonts can be opened for edit on Mac using Word. It then can be saved on disk directly by Mac, returned to WinWord running on PC for another edit session without any incompatibility problem.

Most of commonly used software packages available on the market such as Word, WordPerfect, Excel, PageMaker, QuarkXPress and many others offer both Windows PC and Mac OS versions. If these major software packages often provide the interchangeability feature for English document, VNI Tan Ky offers similar capability for Vietnamese document.

° A solution for Vietnamese language in World Wide Web

VNI fonts are being heavily used by webpage designers on the World Wide Web. A unique feature of VNI fonts is that webpage designed on PC can be displayed by Mac and vice versa.

To read a webpage designed using VNI fonts, font selection must be made to the web browser/explorer software (i.e. Netscape, MS Explorer, Net Browser, etc.) to select fonts that begin with VNI.

If you have not installed VNI fonts for Web on your computer, the fonts can be purchased or downloaded from the internet. VNI has offered free-of-charge the following fonts for Web: VNI-Aptima, VNI-Helve, and VNI-Times which can be downloaded from the internet.

° Where to buy?

VNI Tan Ky for Macintosh and Power Macintosh is available at various computer retailers and bookstores. It is also available by direct order via:

VNI
14091 Goldenwest St.
Westminster, CA 92683, USA
Phone: (714) 891-7656 
Fax: (714) 373-5080

System requirements to run VNI Tan Ky for Macintosh & Power Macintosh: System 8.x through O/S 9.2, 4MB disk storage, and at least 4MB memory.

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