4 ms·

I would like regional flags, even if it would be endless. At some point we're going to need submenus for emoji anyway. Surprised that sunglasses with frown was

I would like regional flags, even if it would be endless. At some point we're going to need submenus for emoji anyway. Surprised that sunglasses with frown was never submitted.

dahfizz 4y ago
It's less of an issue with menus as Unicode. We only have ~1 million Unicode codepoints in total. Wasting one for ever local flag would be a mistake.
- tossaway0 4y ago
  I didn't know that. That said, considering that adopting Unicode was a decision in and of itself, would expanding that space really be such a burden? I'm also now surprised to see that Wales and Scotland get a flag but Northern Ireland does not. Aren't they on the same standing? I always thought it followed UN membership but that Wales and Scotland got an exception. I know Palestine and Kosovo have emojis also. Are there any UN full member states without an emoji?
  - mcdonje 4y ago
    >would expanding that space really be such a burden? It would require dropping UTF-16, which is the limiting factor. That, or defining planes that aren't available to all encodings. Don't hold your breath. I don't know who is using UTF-16 or UTF-32. It seems like most of the world has adopted UTF-8. So, maybe one day UTF-16 and UTF-32 will be dropped and more planes will be defined. That's a big maybe. If it happens at all, it's decades away. There are no conversations to do so that I'm aware of. There are currently 10 planes that are completely unassigned, and there are no current proposals to put anything on them. The Unicode Consortium is very deliberate. Those planes will probably be empty for a long time. And while there are empty planes, they won't be talks about adding new ones. That's my impression. I keep up a bit, but I'm unaffiliated.
    - colejohnson66 4y ago
      > I don't know who is using UTF-16 or UTF-32. Java, JavaScript, Win32's "wide" API, C#, and many more. As for actual file storage, UTF-8 is indeed the most common, but UTF-16 still lingers on.
  - evanb 4y ago
    > The only official flag for Northern Ireland is the Union Flag, the flag of the United Kingdom; there is no official local flag that represents only Northern Ireland. The flying of various flags in Northern Ireland is a significant sectarian issue, with different communities identifying with different flags. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Northern_Ireland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Northern_Ireland
- evan_ 4y ago
  Maybe they could be implemented as combinations of country flag + some kind of reusable region indicator. Like US+33 for Oregon.
  - lifthrasiir 4y ago
    Which is exactly how the current system works. You can already interchange regional flags because it allows pretty much every ISO 3166-2 identifier. It's just that most of them won't be "recommended for general interchange" (RGI) and fonts won't be universally available.
  - pavon 4y ago
    That is how the current flags are implemented, and how the state flags were proposed. This proposal wouldn't have used any additional codepoints.

I would like regional flags, even if it would be endless. At some point we're going to need submenus for emoji anyway. Surprised that sunglasses with frown was never submitted.

dahfizz 4y ago

It's less of an issue with menus as Unicode. We only have ~1 million Unicode codepoints in total. Wasting one for ever local flag would be a mistake.

tossaway0 4y ago
I didn't know that. That said, considering that adopting Unicode was a decision in and of itself, would expanding that space really be such a burden? I'm also now surprised to see that Wales and Scotland get a flag but Northern Ireland does not. Aren't they on the same standing? I always thought it followed UN membership but that Wales and Scotland got an exception. I know Palestine and Kosovo have emojis also. Are there any UN full member states without an emoji?
- mcdonje 4y ago
  >would expanding that space really be such a burden? It would require dropping UTF-16, which is the limiting factor. That, or defining planes that aren't available to all encodings. Don't hold your breath. I don't know who is using UTF-16 or UTF-32. It seems like most of the world has adopted UTF-8. So, maybe one day UTF-16 and UTF-32 will be dropped and more planes will be defined. That's a big maybe. If it happens at all, it's decades away. There are no conversations to do so that I'm aware of. There are currently 10 planes that are completely unassigned, and there are no current proposals to put anything on them. The Unicode Consortium is very deliberate. Those planes will probably be empty for a long time. And while there are empty planes, they won't be talks about adding new ones. That's my impression. I keep up a bit, but I'm unaffiliated.
  - colejohnson66 4y ago
    > I don't know who is using UTF-16 or UTF-32. Java, JavaScript, Win32's "wide" API, C#, and many more. As for actual file storage, UTF-8 is indeed the most common, but UTF-16 still lingers on.
- evanb 4y ago
  > The only official flag for Northern Ireland is the Union Flag, the flag of the United Kingdom; there is no official local flag that represents only Northern Ireland. The flying of various flags in Northern Ireland is a significant sectarian issue, with different communities identifying with different flags. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Northern_Ireland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Northern_Ireland
evan_ 4y ago
Maybe they could be implemented as combinations of country flag + some kind of reusable region indicator. Like US+33 for Oregon.
- lifthrasiir 4y ago
  Which is exactly how the current system works. You can already interchange regional flags because it allows pretty much every ISO 3166-2 identifier. It's just that most of them won't be "recommended for general interchange" (RGI) and fonts won't be universally available.
- pavon 4y ago
  That is how the current flags are implemented, and how the state flags were proposed. This proposal wouldn't have used any additional codepoints.