How to display diacricts marks correctly – using Webpack, Typescript

How to Display Diacritic Marks Correctly – Using Webpack and TypeScript

When working with diacritic marks, such as accents or umlauts, in a web application built with Webpack and TypeScript, you may encounter issues with the correct display of these characters. This can be particularly frustrating, especially when dealing with multilingual content or user-generated input. In this blog post, we will explore a couple of solutions to ensure that diacritic marks are displayed correctly in your TypeScript project.

Solution 1: Normalize the Text

One common approach to handling diacritic marks is to normalize the text using the normalize() function provided by the JavaScript String object. This function allows you to convert the text to a specified Unicode normalization form, such as NFC (Normalization Form Canonical Composition) or NFD (Normalization Form Canonical Decomposition).

Here’s an example of how you can normalize a string in TypeScript:

const text = 'Café';
const normalizedText = text.normalize('NFD');

console.log(normalizedText); // Output: 'Café'

In the above example, the diacritic mark in the original string ‘Café’ is decomposed into two separate characters: ‘Cafe’ and the combining acute accent ‘́’. This ensures that the diacritic mark is correctly displayed in most modern browsers.

Solution 2: Use a Font with Diacritic Support

Another solution to correctly display diacritic marks is to use a font that has built-in support for these characters. Some fonts, especially those designed for multilingual support, include a wide range of diacritic marks to ensure proper rendering.

To use a specific font in your TypeScript project, you can include it in your CSS file or import it directly into your TypeScript code using Webpack’s module bundling capabilities.

Here’s an example of importing a font using Webpack and TypeScript:

// Import the font in your TypeScript code
import './fonts/my-font.woff2';

// Use the imported font in your CSS
body {
  font-family: 'My Font', sans-serif;
}

By using a font with diacritic support, you can ensure that the characters are displayed correctly without the need for additional normalization.

Conclusion

Displaying diacritic marks correctly in a web application built with Webpack and TypeScript can be achieved through text normalization or using a font with built-in diacritic support. Both solutions provide a reliable way to ensure that diacritic marks are rendered accurately, allowing for a better user experience when working with multilingual content or user-generated input.

Remember to choose the solution that best fits your project’s requirements and test it thoroughly to ensure proper functionality across different browsers and platforms.

That’s it for this blog post! We hope you found these solutions helpful in resolving diacritic display issues in your TypeScript project. Happy coding!