Contents 1 Online conversion 2 Offline conversion with UDP 2.1 Tibetan/Dzongkha Font Based Formats[2] 2.2 How to use UDP 2.2.1 First time configuration 2.2.2 Converting files 2.3 Using UDP in Linux or OS-X with Wine 3 Converting between Wylie and Tibetan Unicode 4 Converting Tibetan Unicode into phonetics 5 Converting Tibetan fonts 5.1 Sources

Online conversion

• The trace foundation offers online conversion of the following Tibetan file formats:^[1]

encodings	txt	unicode txt	rtf	html
ACIP Transliteration	yes	yes	yes	yes
ALA-LC Transliteration	yes	yes	yes	yes
Bandrida	yes	no	yes	yes
Beida Founder	yes	no	no	no
Huanguang	yes	no	no	no
LTibetan	no	no	yes	yes
National Standard Extended	no	yes	yes	yes
Sambhota 1.0 (Sama)	no	no	yes	yes
Sambhota 2.0 (Dedris)	no	no	yes	yes
TCRC Bod-Yig	no	no	yes	yes
THDL Wylie	yes	yes	yes	yes
Tibetan Machine	no	no	yes	yes
Tibetan Machine Web	no	no	yes	yes
Tongyuan	yes	no	yes	yes
Unicode	no	yes	yes	yes
Wylie Transliteration	yes	yes	yes	yes

Offline conversion with UDP

For an overview of different available fonts see: Tibetan Fonts.

Tibetan/Dzongkha Font Based Formats^[2]

The most useful conversion program for legacy Tibetan text formats is UDP. UDP converts the following legacy Tibetan text formats into Tibetan Unicode:

• TibetanMachine (free download: www.tibet.dk) and TibetanCaligraphic, TibetanClassic, DzongkhaCaligraphic (commercial fonts: www.tibet.dk)
• TibetanMachineWeb (free download: www.tibet.dk)
• Tibetan Modern A (free download: virginia.edu.)
• Robillard (Ltibetan, etc) (free download: UDP website).
• Sambhota including Dedris, Eedris, Esama/b/c, Sama/b/c, Samw (free download if only used to view ACIP documents, otherwise commercial license required, see nitartha.org.)
• TIBETBT (free download via THDL, direct link: www.tibet.cn
• fonts derived from the "P.R.C. National Standard for Tibetan (Extension A)" (aka "Set A"). For a documentation see Chris Fynn's website: Tibetan Extension A. Chris Fynn's Jomolhari supports this standard.
• TCRC Bod-Yig, TCRC Youtsoweb, TCRC Youtso (free download: www.tchrd.org
• All Tibetan Unicode fonts (of course) (see: Tibetan Fonts)

How to use UDP

First time configuration

1. Get a copy of UDP from UDP website and install the application. UDP can be installed on computers running Windows or on computers running Linux and Wine.
2. Start UDP and select Options/Font... Select Unicode and chose a Unicode Tibetan font.
3. Select Options/Advanced... and select Document are saved by default in: Unicode RTF.

Now every document you will load into UDP will be displayed using a Unicode font and will be saved by default as RTF Unicode. RTF Unicode files can be directly edited using OpenOffice or Microsoft word. See How to edit Tibetan texts.

Converting files

Note: This conversion procedures work best with Windows, but it is also possible to run UDP using Wine for Linux (see below).

• TibetDoc documents:

1. No conversion needed, continue with: Steps common to TibetDoc and Word documents

• Word documents:

1. Export as RTF: Save the document containing legacy Tibetan fonts as RTF document.
2. Simplify the RTF encoding: Many word processors (like Microsoft Word) create RTF files whose encoding is too complex for UDP to understand and that might cause UDP to crash. It is possible to simplify the RTF encoding by loading the RTF file with wordpad (comes with Windows) and directly saving the file in wordpad again. Wordpad writes the file in a format that is easier to process for UDP. Steps: (1) Load RTF file created in step 1 with wordpad. (2) Save it without changes in wordpad.

• Steps common to TibetDoc and Word documents

1. Load into UDP: Load the TibetDoc or RTF file that has been saved in steps above into UDP
2. Create a Tibetan Unicode RTF file: In UDP, chose File/Save as... and select "Rich text Unicode" as output format.
3. Done: Use any Unicode application (e.g. OpenOffice) to work with the resulting file.

Using UDP in Linux or OS-X with Wine

UDP can be installed in Linux if Wine is installed. Simply start the installation program for UDP which can be downloaded from the UDP website.

Mac OS-X users need to install wine first, using for example macports.

Converting between Wylie and Tibetan Unicode

You can use the following online converter to convert between Tibetan Unicode and Wylie:

• DigitalTibetan.org

Converting Tibetan Unicode into phonetics

The following online converter automatically gives the pronunciation of Tibetan Unicode text according to THDL and Rigpa phonetics systems:

• Rigpa phonetics converter
• THDL simplified Tibetan phonetics

Converting Tibetan fonts

• If you want to convert legacy Tibetan fonts to Unicode, have a look at Platform Independent Tibetan Unicode Fonts

Sources

1. ↑ Table from: http://utfc.trace.org/UTFC/resources_tools_UTFC_encoding.html
2. ↑ Table taken from UDP website