problems with your patch

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

Uwe Brauer writes:

 >     -  I am trapped in 21.5.29, because I need the xsymbol
 >        patch you once send me (and saved my life :-D ), but
 >        which I cannot apply to more recent versions of
 >        21.5.X.

I don't see why not.  It might take some adjusting of the patch.

 >        necessary). He even said he wanted to un do this
 >        change in the API, but it seems that he is now too
 >        busy to deal with it.

I'd really rather not.  The API is suboptimal, but repeatedly changing
and reverting APIs for no good reason is worse.  The problem should be
fixed by updating x-symbol to the new API, which I provided a patch
for.

 >     -  what's about all the users of older version of 21.5
 >        or even 21.4, they will not enjoy the possibility of
 >        cp1255 support?

21.4/Mule is basically deprecated at this point because it doesn't
handle Unicode well at all.  Older versions of 21.5 (and 21.4, for
that matter) are not going to get patches, period: if you want
features only available in the latest version, you have to upgrade.

s for handling it as a package, the possibility is there, using CCL.
It's just a lot more tedious to do it without Aidan's 'fixed-width
coding system type.  Aidan's really the only person who might know how
to do it offhand.  I could learn, but it would take a fair amount of
time that I don't have right now.