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HTML
180 lines
9.8 KiB
HTML
<!DOCTYPE html>
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<html lang="en-us">
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<head>
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<meta charset="utf-8">
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<title>Charis - Version 7 Changes</title>
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<meta name="author" content="SIL Writing Systems Technology">
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<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0, user-scalable=yes">
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<link rel="stylesheet" href="./assets/css/theme.css">
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<link rel="stylesheet" href="./assets/css/webfonts.css">
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</head>
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<body>
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<div class="container">
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<article class="article">
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<header>
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<h1 class="title">Charis - Version 7 Changes</h1>
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</header>
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<h2 id="new-major-release">New major release</h2>
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<p>Charis version 7 is a major release with many new additions,
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enhancements, and improvements. This is a summary of the most
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notable changes and what you need to know if you have been using
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earlier versions. <strong>Please read this carefully to understand
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the major changes.</strong> For further details on these changes,
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particularly regarding individual characters, see <a
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href="history.html">Version History</a>.</p>
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<h2 id="family-names-and-structure">Family names and structure</h2>
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<h3 id="font-family-names-have-changed">Font family names have
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changed</h3>
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<p>Since the changes to both line metrics and spacing are so
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extensive, we have changed the names of the fonts for version 7.</p>
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<ul>
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<li><em>Charis SIL</em> is now <em>Charis</em></li>
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</ul>
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<p>This enables you to keep the old v6.2 fonts installed when you
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install the new v7 ones. Projects and documents can then be
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gradually changed to use the new v7. <strong>We do recommend that
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you start using v7 right away and phase out your use of v6.2 as soon
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as possible.</strong></p>
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<h3 id="revised-family-groups-with-additional-weights">Revised
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family groups with additional weights</h3>
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<p>Charis now has additional intermediate weights. Previously
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existing weights have not changed. The CSS values for the weights
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within each family are in parentheses. Italic faces follow a similar
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structure and correspondence.</p>
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<p><img src="assets/images/weights.png" class="fullsize"
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alt="New v7 weights" />
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<!-- PRODUCT SITE IMAGE SRC https://software.sil.org/charis/wp-content/uploads/sites/14/2025/05/weights.png --></p>
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<p>The new intermediate weights in this extended, axis-based family
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can be confusing for applications that still assume families should
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have only four members (Regular, Italic, Bold, Bold Italic). This is
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the case for Microsoft Word and some older Windows applications. For
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details on how to use the intermediate weights in these
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applications, see <a
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href="https://software.sil.org/fonts/axis-based-fonts/">Using
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Axis-Based Font Families</a>.</p>
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<h3
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id="decreased-default-line-spacing---and-no-compact-versions">Decreased
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default line spacing - and no Compact versions</h3>
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<p>The default line spacing of Charis has been significantly
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decreased. In the past, line spacing had to be extreme to avoid
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clipping of tall letters and high diacritics on Windows. This is no
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longer a problem, so we’ve been able to reduce the default line
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spacing to be more similar to other common text fonts. <strong>We
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continue to recommend that you set line spacing explicitly in your
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document styles and preferences, and adjust it as needed for your
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particular situation.</strong></p>
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<p>The v7 fonts do not have <em>Compact</em> variants. The new
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default line spacing is closer to the previous version’s
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<em>Compact</em> line spacing. If you still need even closer line
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spacing, and your application does not allow explicit control over
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line spacing, you can continue to use the <a
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href="https://software.sil.org/lcgfonts/download/">v6.2 Charis SIL
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Compact fonts</a>, which remain available. <strong>If you need any
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of the new v7 features or characters, but also need them supported
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in a compact version please <a
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href="https://software.sil.org/charis/about/contact/">contact
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us</a>.</strong></p>
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<p>TypeTuner Web no longer offers line spacing alternatives for the
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v7 fonts (Normal, Tight, Loose). If you need Tight or Loose variants
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the v6.2 fonts remain available and support line spacing
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alternatives.</p>
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<h3
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id="special-purpose-modified-variants-have-not-been-updated-to-v7">Special-purpose
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modified variants have not been updated to v7</h3>
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<p>In previous versions, special-purpose modified font variants were
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available that had been ‘pre-tuned’ to turn on certain features by
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default for some regional and <em>Literacy</em> uses. These are not
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available for the v7 fonts, however, the <a
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href="https://software.sil.org/lcgfonts/download/">v6.2
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special-purpose fonts are still available</a>. <strong>If you need
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any of the new features or characters in this version, but also need
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them supported in the special-purpose modified fonts please <a
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href="https://software.sil.org/charis/about/contact/">contact
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us</a>.</strong></p>
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<p>Note that even in version 7 the literacy forms and other features
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can be manually preset with <a
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href="https://typetunerweb.languagetechnology.org/ttw/fonts2go.cgi">TypeTuner
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Web</a>. The only change to this is that the 'pre-tuned' versions
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remain at version 6.2.</p>
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<h2 id="new-features-and-character-support">New features and
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character support</h2>
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<h3 id="new-kerning">New kerning</h3>
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<p>Kerning has now been added to cover the full range of alphabetic
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symbols except for small caps (which will be included in a future
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update). To make this practically useful for a wide range of
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languages, the letters have been clustered into overly generalized
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groups. This enables the kerning to apply to more combinations, but
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does not allow for careful fine-tuning. The generalized kerning may
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not be ideal in all cases, and may still require manual adjustment,
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but it should provide improved spacing compared with previous
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versions. It is very possible that we have made some mistakes in
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this massive kerning effort, so please <a
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href="https://software.sil.org/charis/about/contact/">contact us</a>
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if you encounter any combinations whose spacing has been made worse
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than in v6.2.</p>
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<p><strong>Warning: Because of the addition of extensive kerning,
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line, paragraph, and page lengths may be different from
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v6.2.</strong></p>
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<p><img src="assets/images/kerning.png" class="fullsize"
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alt="New kerning" />
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<!-- PRODUCT SITE IMAGE SRC https://software.sil.org/charis/wp-content/uploads/sites/14/2025/05/kerning.png --></p>
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<h3 id="proportional-oldstyle-figures">Proportional Oldstyle
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figures</h3>
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<p>Charis now includes support for standard OpenType proportional
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oldstyle figures (<code>onum</code>). These only apply to the main
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numerals, not fractions, superscripts, or numeral-based symbols.</p>
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<p><img src="assets/images/oldstylefigures.png" class="fullsize"
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alt="Oldstyle figures" />
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<!-- PRODUCT SITE IMAGE SRC https://software.sil.org/charis/wp-content/uploads/sites/14/2025/05/oldstylefigures.png --></p>
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<h3
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id="capital-n-left-hook-default-changed-to-lowercase-style">Capital
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N Left Hook default changed to lowercase style</h3>
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<p>The default form for capital N with left hook has been changed to
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the lowercase style to match the capital Eng. The related feature
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(<code>cv44</code>) has been changed to substitute the uppercase
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style form. See the <a href="features.html">Feature list</a>.</p>
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<h3
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id="additional-character-support-including-unicode-16">Additional
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character support including Unicode 16</h3>
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<p>Support has been added for 29 additional characters, some of
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which were introduced in Unicode 16. For a full list see <a
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href="history.html">Version History</a>.</p>
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<h2 id="consistent-autohinting">Consistent autohinting</h2>
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<p>Autohinting has been improved to be more consistent across the
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whole family.</p>
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<img src="assets/images/v7autohinting.png" class="fullsize"
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alt="Charis autohinting" />
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<!-- PRODUCT SITE IMAGE SRC https://software.sil.org/charis/wp-content/uploads/sites/14/2025/05/v7autohinting.png -->
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<figcaption>
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Upright and italic faces appear more consistent in height in smaller
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sizes (Windows 11, Word, 9 pt, 150%, enlarged)
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</figcaption>
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<h2 id="general-improvements">General improvements</h2>
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<p>Other improvements have been made to over 150 glyphs, OpenType
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code, and other font aspects, including:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>Letters with upper-right hooks have been redesigned to improve
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spacing (including kerning) and reduce collisions. Some collisions
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have been retained to reduce unwanted whitespace within words (e.g.
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ƴk).</li>
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<li>Central European carons have improved designs and kerning.</li>
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<li>Bridging diacritics handle many more possible combinations. See
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<a href="https://software.sil.org/fonts/bridging-diacritics/">Using
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Bridging Diacritics</a> for details on how these need to be encoded
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and ordered.</li>
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<li>The small caps feature now affects parentheses and
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brackets.</li>
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</ul>
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<p>For more details see <a href="history.html">Version
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History</a>.</p>
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<p>If you have any difficulty with these changes, or have other
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suggestions on how we can make the fonts better, please <a
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href="https://software.sil.org/charis/about/contact/">contact
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us</a>.</p>
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<footer class="footer">
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<p>This guide is from the <a href="https://software.sil.org/charis/" title="" class="active">Charis project</a> version 7 and is copyright © 1997-2025 SIL Global.</p>
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</footer>
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</article>
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</div>
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</body>
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</html>
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