General ⇒ Why isn't Korean working?

[Noraft]

I'm using MiKTeX 2.7 and the distribution came with Korean fonts (at least, there is a folder called "Korean" in the fonts directory, and it has stuff in it).

I'm also using TeXnicCenter to do my coding, and Korean characters show up as question marks.

What do I need to do?

[localghost]

The first step could be to take a look at the TeX Catalogue to learn more about the way LaTeX supports Korean [1]. Perhaps your local TeX Users Group has more information about this issue [2]. I think these people should know how to make it work.

[1] The TeX Catalogue Online, Topic Index - Multilingual Support: Korean
[2] Korean TeX Users Group


Best regards
Thorsten¹

[Noraft]

According to my MiKTeX Package Browser, I have cjk language support and cjk fonts installed.

Further, when I open any graphic input dialog box in TeXnicCenter, such as "Find Files" I can type in Korean characters in the form fields. For example, I can search for 정. But if I type that character into the main editing window with a .tex file open, I get ? marks. Now the interesting thing is that something (I don't know if it is the program or Vista) is recognizing the input; the character I typed above requires three keystrokes, and the ? doesn't appear until I've typed all three keystrokes. For two- and four-keystroke characters, I get the same thing.

I even checked to see if it was just the interface that couldn't display the Korean, by building and viewing the file in PDF, but the ? marks appear in the PDF as well. *sigh*

What am I missing?

[phi]

TeXnicCenter is probably built as 8-bit (non-Unicode) application, like many old Windows programs. Use a better text editor (even Notepad will do) and save the file as UTF-8. Then try to use \usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}. If that doesn't work, try it with utf8x. I don't have any experience with Korean in LaTeX (Standard TeX is not based on Unicode and so has to struggle with every language anew), but if it's only the input that is the problem then simply avoid TeXnicCenter. You might also consider using XeLaTeX instead, it is based on modern standards like Unicode and OpenType, which were designed for multi-language support in the first place.

[Noraft]

TeXnicCenter is probably built as 8-bit (non-Unicode) application, like many old Windows programs. Use a better text editor (even Notepad will do) and save the file as UTF-8. Then try to use \usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}. If that doesn't work, try it with utf8x. I don't have any experience with Korean in LaTeX (Standard TeX is not based on Unicode and so has to struggle with every language anew), but if it's only the input that is the problem then simply avoid TeXnicCenter. You might also consider using XeLaTeX instead, it is based on modern standards like Unicode and OpenType, which were designed for multi-language support in the first place.

Sweet. I'll give that a shot and report back to the thread. Thanks!

[localghost]

Good LaTeX IDEs supporting Unicode are TeXmaker or Winshell. TeXnicCenter will support Unicode with its upcoming Version 2.0, which is currently developed.

[Noraft]

Good LaTeX IDEs supporting Unicode are TeXmaker or Winshell. TeXnicCenter will support Unicode with its upcoming Version 2.0, which is currently developed.

For WinShell, Korean character support wasn't obvious, but was easier with TeXmaker. Good call!

So I'm a bit closer now to a permanent solution, I think. TeXmaker allows me to do UTF-8 encoding, which allows me to input Korean characters and they show up correctly on the screen when I am inputting them. They also save correctly (the saved document is reopened with the characters displayed correctly. However, when I view the DVI, the characters are not in the output. If I have a Korean word in parentheses, the DVI output just displays ().

Another problem is that "View DVI" works, but none of the other output options work (DVIPS, PDFLaTeX, etc.). In the logs, I get Line 2 !Text line contains an invalid character, when the only character on the line is %. Is it simply that they aren't recognizing the UTF-8?

Thanks again,

[phi]

I've tried several things, but I couldn't get it working. Probably it's best to avoid LaTeX and use XeLaTeX instead, which allows you to use any font that is installed on your system:

Code: Select all

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{fontspec}
\usepackage{xunicode}
\usepackage{xltxtra}
\setmainfont{UnDotum}

\begin{document}
정
\end{document}

(UnDotum works on my system, but on yours there is certainly a different Korean or Unicode font installed)

[Noraft]

Alright, so I had ProTeXt installed, which includes MiKTeX, and I separately had ConTeX from an older installation. I noticed in my MiKTeX folder that XeTeX had a subfolder, but was having trouble with XeTeX commands, so I uninstalled everything and am starting from scratch with TeX Live 2008, which includes XeTeX.

I'm downloading the .iso now, then will mount it and run the installation. Is XeTeX like a package I will need to install separately?

Anyway, will get back to you all once I have it all up and running in a few hours!

Thanks!

[phi]

xetex is a different program, not just a package. But you'll also need the packages fontspec, xunicode, and xtlxtra, which should be included.