[This document should be read with the HZ interpreter turned off.]

This is only a brief tutorial to get you started with the HZ 
specification. It is not meant to be complete, and I can't even
guarantee that it is 100% correct. For the original HZ specification,
please refers to Fung Fung Lee's documents. (see HZ-2.0.tar.Z in
ahkcus.org:src/unix.)


In the HZ specification, each Chinese character is represented by
2 ASCII characters -- the same characters you see in English
documents. This property enables Chinese text to be safely trans-
mitted through any networks that can safely transmit ASCII characters,
which is the big reason why we are using HZ on the net.

Since the HZ characters and ASCII characters are the same, there
must be some way to tell them apart. The HZ specification says that
each block of HZ Chinese characters must be immediately preceeded
by a ~{ sequence and immediately followed by a ~} sequence. For
example:

  ~{UbJGR;>dVPND!#~}

ZWDOS gives you the facilities to input Chinese characters, but it
doesn't help you get them into the HZ format. You must supply the
~{ and ~} sequences yourself. i.e., in order to input HZ-coded
Chinese characters with ZWDOS, you must (1) type ~{, (2) input the
Chinese characters, (3) type ~} to finish it off.

It is important that your HZ documents confirm to the HZ spec
closely in order for your document to be readable for everyone.
There are many HZ readers out there and not all of them are like
ZWDOS -- the fact that ZWDOS is tolerant of certain errors doesn't
mean other softwares will do the same. To maximize HZ conformity,
you should observe these simple guidelines:

  (1) ALWAYS close each ~{ sequence with a ~} sequence on the
same line.  Forgetting the ~} at the end of a line of Chinese
characters may generate an error with some HZ decoders.

  (2) DO NOT embed ASCII text inside a sequence of Chinese 
characters. Always use ~} to switch to ASCII mode before entering
ASCII text. If you only need one or two ASCII characters, you
can also type # before typing each ASCII character.

Also, please realizes that the sequence ~~{ does NOT indicate
the start of a Chinese sequence. Here the first ~ is an escape
character telling the HZ decoder not to interpret the following
~{ sequence.