Backwards compatibility or sanity? help

[hh]

> > Hermann wrote: 
> > Why is the number of items or having the property "item" 
> > of a string dependent on the writing/reading direction 
> > of the string?

> Monte wrote:
> Hmm… I’ll answer your question with a question: Which item is item 1?

The string "a," has currently ..
[RTL] .. reading (or embedding) the string right-to-left:
      two items and empty is among its items.
      RTL-item 1 is empty, RTL-item 2 is "a".
[LTR] .. reading (or embedding) the string left-to-right:
      one item and empty is not among its items.
      LTR-item 1 is "a". And LTR-item 2 is empty
      (item 2 of "a," is empty --> returns true).

Moreover, similar:
empty is among the items of empty --> returns false
item 1 of empty is empty --> returns true