4 ms·

As someone that whose native language isn't representable purely by ASCII, I celebrate it. Plus the first 128 codepoints are same as ASCII in UT-8. Is Unicode

by mnau 2y ago

As someone that whose native language isn't representable purely by ASCII, I celebrate it. Plus the first 128 codepoints are same as ASCII in UT-8. Is Unicode kind of messy? Sure, but that's just natural consequences of writing systems being messy. Every point you made was for a sensible reason that is in a scope of Unicode mission (representing all text in all writing systems).

WalterBright 2y ago
I'm sure that books can be printed in your language without any need for semantic information in the characters.
- mnau 2y ago
  Yes, they can. Is it a problem that they do? I don't think so. Using semantic symbols seems far better option. Most fonts simply map multiple codepoints to a single glyph while dealing with all fun stuff like ligatures and all fun from GSUB tables (and fun company tables in fonts). Honestly, I see semantic information as an absolute win and good choice. If unicode didn't contain it, it would have to be somewhere else (or making ratehr unpleasant choices like having fj together). It's an illusion that it wouldn't. People want pretty text. Rest of the world doesn't care. They want pretty text everywhere. Instead of hating unicode, there would be hating "glyph points" plus "markup" (that would be literally everwere, from email to form editors) have all kinds of problems.
  - WalterBright 2y ago
    > Using semantic symbols seems far better option Except it doesn't actually work. 'a' has a zillion different semantic meanings, all dependent on context. There is no crisis with somebody reading a book and misunderstanding which particular semantic meaning it has, because it is inferred from the context. Semantic meaning always comes from context, and Unicode cannot fix that. People can use the mathematical code point for 'a' instead of the text 'a' and the semantic Unicode meaning is meaningless because the reader will see, like the letter 'a' in because, that it is a text meaning. The only thing you get with multiple code points for 'a' is you can send out multiple identical appearing texts, but are different Unicode, so you can determine who leaked the memo. Unicode's extremely limited markup ability helps nobody.
- eviks 2y ago
  How do you Ctrl+F in a printed book? Why printed when we're taking about digital?
  - WalterBright 2y ago
    If you search for 'a', which one of the Unicode 'a's will it find?
    - eviks 2y ago
      the one in your language's alphabet, not just anything that looks similar

by mnau 2y ago

WalterBright 2y ago

I'm sure that books can be printed in your language without any need for semantic information in the characters.

mnau 2y ago
Yes, they can. Is it a problem that they do? I don't think so. Using semantic symbols seems far better option. Most fonts simply map multiple codepoints to a single glyph while dealing with all fun stuff like ligatures and all fun from GSUB tables (and fun company tables in fonts). Honestly, I see semantic information as an absolute win and good choice. If unicode didn't contain it, it would have to be somewhere else (or making ratehr unpleasant choices like having fj together). It's an illusion that it wouldn't. People want pretty text. Rest of the world doesn't care. They want pretty text everywhere. Instead of hating unicode, there would be hating "glyph points" plus "markup" (that would be literally everwere, from email to form editors) have all kinds of problems.
- WalterBright 2y ago
  > Using semantic symbols seems far better option Except it doesn't actually work. 'a' has a zillion different semantic meanings, all dependent on context. There is no crisis with somebody reading a book and misunderstanding which particular semantic meaning it has, because it is inferred from the context. Semantic meaning always comes from context, and Unicode cannot fix that. People can use the mathematical code point for 'a' instead of the text 'a' and the semantic Unicode meaning is meaningless because the reader will see, like the letter 'a' in because, that it is a text meaning. The only thing you get with multiple code points for 'a' is you can send out multiple identical appearing texts, but are different Unicode, so you can determine who leaked the memo. Unicode's extremely limited markup ability helps nobody.
eviks 2y ago
How do you Ctrl+F in a printed book? Why printed when we're taking about digital?
- WalterBright 2y ago
  If you search for 'a', which one of the Unicode 'a's will it find?
  - eviks 2y ago
    the one in your language's alphabet, not just anything that looks similar