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the Rp
Posted by Jackson in
2 Nov 2005 — 7:46pm
2 Nov 2005 — 7:46pm
Can anyone explain the Rp ligature. I can't seem to find any information or examples of its use. Thanks in advance!
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2 Nov 2005 — 9:16pm
It's the Indian currency the Rupee.
Cheers, Si
2 Nov 2005 — 9:19pm
Simple enough. Thank you!
2 Nov 2005 — 9:21pm
No, that's 'Rs' - sorry. Although i have the feeling some fonts used 'Rp' I'll check when I get into the office.
Si
2 Nov 2005 — 9:30pm
The Rp abbreviation is the Rupiah. Indonesian. Designed on the tabular. Typeset before the numericals
2 Nov 2005 — 10:03pm
Found it - http://www.myfonts.com/unicode/20a8/
"Rp" seems to be a legacy or possibly incorrect design for the Rupee in some fonts. Seems as if "Rs" is the current form.
http://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U20A0.pdf
3 Nov 2005 — 9:29am
U+20A8 is the Indian rupeeh abbreviation, which is indeed Rs. I think there is some confusion because many years ago Adobe included the Indonesian rupiah abbreviation Rp in their expert set fonts. The rupiah sign is not encoded as such in Unicode, most likely because Indonesians simply use the letters R and p. In their OT fonts, Adobe use a Private Use Area codepoint for the rupia (U+F6DD). My guess is that the Monotype folk who worked on Palatino Linotype were familiar with the Rp glyph from Adobe expert set fonts, and thought this was the rupeeh sign.
3 Nov 2005 — 9:57am
That would explain why I'm seeing it mostly in Adobe fonts. It's also in Galliard and some Emigre fonts - mrs eaves, matrix, and journal. Interesting. Thanks again.
3 Nov 2005 — 10:36am
>My guess is that the Monotype folk who worked on Palatino Linotype were familiar with the Rp glyph from Adobe expert set fonts, and thought this was the rupeeh sign.
You're probably right about Palatino Linotype - it was likely in the expert set data that came over from Linotype and the guys decided to map it to 20A8.
29 Mar 2007 — 3:12pm
Here's David Lemon's own words about the presence of this glyph in Adobe's fonts:
Back in the ancient days of Type 1 fonts, Adobe defined a basic character set for Latin. Since Type 1 fonts were limited to one-bye encodings, we soon decided we needed a supplemental set to hold the kinds of glyphs needed for more advanced typography. We set about building a list for what was to become the Expert set.
Many pieces were obvious: small capitals, oldstyle figures, additional f ligatures, superior & inferior figures, more dashes, and the "French" alphabetic superiors. We looked around, and noticed that this set, combined with the base set, was very similar to the set URW was producing for ITC fonts at that point. There were just two additional currency characters in the ITC set: the colon and rupiah.
Adobe hadn't learned much about the Latin market outside Europe and North America yet. We decided that if ITC was including these currency characters, there was probably a good reason, and we might as well meet the ITC "standard". So we added them in the Expert set.
Years later, when I mentioned this to Cynthia Hollandsworth (now Cynthia Batty), she suggested that the colon and rupiah got into the ITC set via Agfa, which had some large corporate clients doing business in those regions. The derivation of character sets is always intriguing, and full of odds bits of legacy!
- thanks,
David L
29 Mar 2007 — 3:34pm
So Monotype copied Linotype who copied Adobe who copied ITC who copied Agfa - all of whom are now owned by Monotype (except Adobe) so we've come full circle! Didn't Jim Wasco work for all of these companies? Maybe he's to blame? ;-)
10 Jul 2011 — 12:36am
.... six years without completion !! :-)
Greetings to you all.
Rp is the currency of Indonesia. Its history indeed is derived from the Indian Rupee which of mentioning -- reasonably suspected -- to have been combined with the mention of Arabs so that being "rupiah" (name) and "Rp" (symbol) and also "IDR" (international code)
The placement "Rp" at different codepoint on some fonts has confusing of course. While we see that Unicode still leaves some "empty slots" (U+20BA ... U+20CF). So in my humble opinion, it makes more sense if "Rp" should be moving to one of these codepoint. We wait from Unicode, Adobe, Microsoft or anyone authorized to handle this.
And more importantly (related the standard codepage) I think this is the moment to arrange the codepoint of all the existing currencies.
Best Regards.
10 Jul 2011 — 7:29am
Yeah. Rp is Indonesian Rupiah. It commonly consist of 2 characters 'R' and 'p'
10 Jul 2011 — 10:12am
And more importantly (related the standard codepage) I think this is the moment to arrange the codepoint of all the existing currencies.
Mixed feelings. Almost every country has/had its own currency, so it may take a while to decide the codepoints and design guidelines for all of those: xe.com lists 165.
I’d rather go for initials: USD for dollar, EUR for euro, MXN for Mexican peso, and so on. But that’s just me.
10 Jul 2011 — 11:03am
I’d rather go for initials: USD for dollar, EUR for euro …
These are two parts of the brain. The technical abbreviations you mention are just the poor modern banker’s workaround to circumvent his disability of handling $, £, € and the like on his devices. These *typographical* abbreviations, on the other hand, have been born out of the scribal need (of former centuries) to speed up the merchant’s everyday recording pensum by replacing “Libra” by £ – and getting faster. But not every currency inherited it’s own typographical symbol.
However, signs like £ and $ have gained symbolic meaning over the time. So that it became desirable for emerging currencies/states to furnish their own monetary unit with a special typographical glyph – both as an abbreviation in text *and* a brand-like symbol. Therefore we have seen quite a lot enterprises to establish new signs of such kind recently: Armenia, Azerbaidschan, Russia, India; not to mention many local currency initiatives which also embark on creating a captivating sign for their own money.
I wondered about the Rp./.Rs issue for years. Thank you all for enlightening me.
10 Jul 2011 — 2:59pm
The technical abbreviations you mention are just the poor modern banker’s workaround.
Well, I guess I prefer the workaround. Less confusing, IMHO.
12 Jul 2011 — 11:48am
Andreas, the standardisation of unique currency codes is not just a technical workaround for instability in correctly displaying currency symbols, it is also necessary because some currencies do not have well established written symbols and some different currencies use the same written symbol. Many currencies use the $ sign, for instance, and not only for dollars, but also pesos and other currencies. These need to be differentiated in financial transactions; hence AUD, BBD, BSD, CAD, FJD, HKD, JMD, LRD, NIO, SGD, TOP, USD, WST, etc.
12 Jul 2011 — 12:19pm
John,
yes of course, I was aware of that. Too-fast writing, I admit …
Anyway, I cant help feeling that it still *is a workaround*, though a fairly reasonable one. But when every country boasts with its own flag – why not everyone having a unique money symbol?
;-) would be nice for us, at least …
13 Jul 2011 — 3:26am
why not everyone having a unique money symbol?
None care about Indonesian Rupiah Symbol here, too much corruption
23 Jul 2011 — 4:19am
..... too much corruption
Do not fuss, so-so we keep a little secret, LoL
In fact, the Currency is a symbol of power. Although each currency made of paper or the same metal. But they had been differentiated in the value and "strength". So it can be said that one dominates the other. But this is a long and complicated story.
;-) would be nice for us, at least …
I agree that no matter how small the value of the currency of a country, should he appear in the each symbol of the identity, as is we recognized the flag and sovereignty of countries. Unless there are an agenda behind it. But we are not well knew. IMHO
Off course, typographical design problem is an entirely different issue and has different at all.
"As designers, we will always accept a project, as long as profitable, even if it was from hell, LoL" (Just Joke dot com)