#Unicode

[strawbuniis]

ೖׅᗣ໋֟፝͜͝ᗣ֮ׄ͜⏜͜ᩘּׅ̤⏜ꉹꠥ۪۪۪፝֟͡ 🎀ꉹꠥ۪۪۪፝֟͡ ⏜͜ᩘּׅ̤⏜֮ׄ͜ᗣ໋֟፝͜͝ᗣׅ𑐹ׄ

⠀ׄ. ⠀ ꒰ྀི 🎀ᩙ⠀pret︩︪tɥ⠀⠀𖹭⠀𝗌ιᰰmb𑄝ᥣ𝗌! ᲐᲐ

໒ © 𓈒 𝖻ⴗ  𖹭 ‎ֹ ‎ 𝖻𝗎ꪀι۫𝖽𝗈໊𝗅𝗅ყ in tumblr ‎ ̼ Ა

ʚ͜ᰓ͜���ɞ͡　ִ　᷼ʚ͜ᰓ͜ິɞ　🌸　ʚ͜ᰓ͜ິɞ᷼　ִ　͡ʚ͜ᰓ͜ິɞ

⩁᤻፝֟⩁᤻ ׄ ׅ ✿֟ ׄ ׄ ׅ ෪᳕᩼ 𖹭

ꉹ᷐፝֟ꉹ᷐ `ı᳘ა ப֟፝⃜͡ப⃜ t𖹭𝗹𝗄ι𝗇𝗴` ඉ 🍼ᩨᷘᮬ ࣪

ㅤ  ㅤㅤ ㅤ᷼𓏹͡  ᷼ᮬ֟፝𓏹͡  ᷼ᮬ፝֟𓏹͡  ᮬㅤ🪷𔘏ㅤ᷼𓏹͡  ᷼ᮬ֟፝𓏹͡  ᷼ᮬ፝֟𓏹͡  ᮬ

ᤌ ƚᧉ 𖹭 𝖽ᧉ𝗌ᧉ꯭ᨣ ׄ ꭎ𝗇 ๑ 𝗅ı𝗇𝖽ᨣ

ᨚ 𝖽ıα ִ ׄ 𝖼ıᧉ︩︪𝗅ᨣ Ა

⠀ ꔫ⠀⠀〇⠀⠀⍰⠀⠀ര⠀⠀ᝪ⠀⠀ ೀ⠀⠀ױ⠀⠀♡𝅼 ⠀⠀๑

𓂂⠀彡⠀⠀୭⠀⠀﹖⠀𖣠⠀⠀｡ ⠀⠀⌗⠀⠀෧⠀⠀𖠗⠀⠀𑁪

⠀˖⠀⠀ㅋ⠀⠀★⠀⠀♥︎⠀⠀໒⠀⠀˚⠀⠀˳⠀ᰍ⠀⠀ᨀ⠀⠀ ✻

ᅟ ꉹꠥ۪۪۪፝֟͡ १✿ᩧ̼ ፝֟ ( ͜͡ ( ͜͡ ) ͜͡ ) 🌸͚ᩦ ( ͜͡ ( ͜͡ ) ͜͡ ) ፝֟ ✿ᩧ̼१ꉹꠥ۪۪۪፝֟͡

໒ 🌸ᩙ ׄ ׅ 𝕖𝗑ᩚ𝗍𐐲⍺︩︪𝗌 : ㅤ

🪷 ̫̫⃞ 𔓗ᅟꉹꠥ۪۪۪፝֟͡ text text text

🎀⃞ 𔓗ᅟ ꉹꠥ۪۪۪፝֟͡ text text text

ㅤㅤ

🪷 ̫̫⃞ 𔓗ᅟꉹꠥ۪۪۪፝֟͡ text text text

໒ © 𓈒 𝖻ⴗ  𖹭 ‎ֹ ‎ 𝖻𝗎ꪀι۫𝖽𝗈໊𝗅𝗅ყ in tumblr! ‎ ̼ Ა

[hbmmaster]

What is your favourite Unicode character?

U+FE18 ︘ PRESENTATION FORM FOR VERTICAL RIGHT WHITE LENTICULAR BRAKCET

[kaasiand]

giving comic sans better unicode support 😁

[markscherz]

u know there are reptile and amphibian hieroglyphs/unicode characters too? 𓆏𓆈𓆉𓆕

I KNEW ABOUT THE FROG BUT THE OTHERS ARE NEW TO ME AND WOWOW! 𓆈 AND 𓆉 ARE INCREDIBLE.

[janmisali]

did you know? ithkuil's writing system is so complicated that if you were to attempt to encode every character as its own thing (as opposed to breaking it down into its components and encoding those) there literally is not enough space in unicode for every character

[hymneminium]

There are ~150,000 assigned code points in Unicode. At 500 glyphs to a page that'd take only 300 pages. Vividly imagining a telegraph operator decoding UTF-8 in his head, looking up scalar values in his reference book, consulting another much slimmer volume with flow charts to resolve zero-width joiners, picking an emoji rubber stamp out of a drawer, pressing it into the correct Fitzpatrick skin color ink pad, adding the reaction to the right sheet in the ring binder of Slack messages and standing by for the next transmission

[labyrinthdancer]

ddidjdjs new fonts to learn HYPED i’m bouncing off the walls

look at wind waker’s!!!!!!

look at twilight princess!!!!

I might have to get off my butt and learn how to make

I might have to get back into learning how to make unicodes cause I think it would be cool to write a fic in one of these

[same-pic-rick-roll]

----- .---- ----- .---- ----- ----- ----- .---- / ----- .---- .---- .---- ----- .---- ----- .---- / ----- .---- .---- ----- ----- .---- ----- .---- / ----- .---- .---- ----- ----- .---- ----- .---- / ----- .---- .---- ----- .---- .---- .---- ----- / ----- ----- .---- ----- ----- .---- .---- .---- / ----- .---- .---- .---- ----- ----- .---- .---- / ----- ----- .---- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- / ----- ----- .---- .---- .---- ----- ----- ----- / ----- .---- .---- .---- ----- .---- ----- ----- / ----- .---- .---- ----- .---- ----- ----- ----- / ----- ----- .---- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- / ----- .---- .---- ----- ----- ----- ----- .---- / ----- .---- .---- ----- .---- .---- ----- ----- / ----- .---- .---- ----- ----- ----- .---- ----- / ----- .---- .---- .---- ----- .---- ----- .---- / ----- .---- .---- ----- .---- .---- ----- .----

Well played anon, well played.

I will not translate for y’all, but protip, get a morse to text decoder, and then a binary to text decoder.

Figure it out for yourself.

It’ll be more impactful that way.

[kiragecko]

Angkorian Khmer is one of the languages I study. It's beautiful - a Cambodian interpretation of a South Indian language and script. There are thousands of inscriptions that still exist, and a lot of research done. It also is currently impossible to write on a computer.

You can write in Modern Khmer. You can write in several older scripts. (~sorta~ The characters exist, but there aren't really fonts or keyboards.) But, writing in any form of Angkorian Khmer is impossible.

I can make keyboard layouts pretty fast, these days. Fonts are a lot harder, but I've had a bit of success. The problem is that there is no perfect block of unicode to attach these things to, and a WHOLE BUNCH of equally imperfect ones. All in different ways.

Do I want to be able to write 'ṛ'* after a consonant, and numbers over 9? Can't just make an alternate font for modern Khmer.

Do I want to be able to make proper consonant clusters? Can't use Devanagari, which has the widest variety of special Sanskrit characters. Or Brahmi, the ancestor to most of these scripts, which actually has support for the numbers I need.

Do I want to be able to write 'au' after a consonant, and numbers over 9? Can't use Kawi (Old Javanese), a closely related script from the same period, that works in very similar ways.

-

Which unsatisfactory option should I choose? Or should I wait another decade, hoping academia will finally do it for me?

Annoying!

-

* or 'ḷ', 'ṝ' and 'ḹ', but the only reason I'd need to write ANY of those is if I was making a hypothetical period grammar, and including Indian characters that don't actually get used, and in some cases even the INDIAN grammarians were just adding to make pretty grids. Which I WANT to do, but understand is not actually a necessity.

[disease]

ALCHEMICAL SYMBOLS | UNICODE

🜀 🜐 🜠 🜰 🝀 🝐 🝠 🝰 🜁 🜑 🜡 🜱 🝁 🝑 🝡 🝱 🜂 🜒 🜢 🜲 🝂 🝒 🝢 🝲 🜃 🜓 🜣 🜳 🝃 🝓 🝣 🝳 🜄 🜔 🜤 🜴 🝄 🝔 🝤 🝴 🜅 🜕 🜥 🜵 🝅 🝕 🝥 🝵 🜆 🜖 🜦 🜶 🝆 🝖 🝦 🝶 🜇 🜗 🜧 🜷 🝇 🝗 🝧 🜈 🜘 🜨 🜸 ��� 🝘 🝨 🜉 🜙 🜩 🜹 🝉 🝙 🝩 🜊 🜚 🜪 🜺 🝊 🝚 🝪 🜋 🜛 🜫 🜻 🝋 🝛 🝫 🝻 🜌 🜜 🜬 🜼 🝌 🝜 🝬 🝼 🜍 🜝 🜭 🜽 🝍 🝝 🝭 🝽 🜎 🜞 🜮 🜾 🝎 🝞 🝮 🝾 🜏 🜟 🜯 🜿 🝏 🝟 🝯 🝿

[foone]

I understand the technical reasons* why it happens but I hate that a lot of times the trans flag emoji shows up as 🏳️ ⚧️.

FIX YOUR UNICODE + EMOJI SUPPORT, EVERYWHERE.

It's often even inconsistent within a single site. Like it'll show up properly in usernames, but then break in page titles.

*Flags are a nightmare in unicode because they can't just encode specific flags or even specific countries, so there's a whole thing where flags are not codepoints, but instead there's a special Flag Alphabet and you make flags by encoding country names (accordin g to ISO 3166-1 Alpha-2, of course) with the Flag Alphabet. So, like, instead of there being a codepoint for the american flag, you just write [Regional Indicator Symbol Letter U][Regional Indicator Symbol Letter S], or "🇺🇸", which should show up as an american flag. It doesn't seem to work here for Reasons.

Anyway, since Trans People aren't a country (YET), they decided to do something different: It's a ZWJ emoji!

Zero Width Joiners are a trick used in a bunch of places in emojispace to do variants. It's a used to glue multiple symbols together to make new emoji without needing to define new code points, with a hopefully sensible fallback. So like, when there's a symbol for, like, "postal worker", you can get a "female postworker" emoji by doing [female emoji][ZWJ][postal worker]" and the rendering engine is supposed to apply a gender-specific variant of the emoji for this.

So to make the trans flag, they used a generic flag 🏳️ [U-1F3F3 WAVING WHITE FLAG] , then an emoji selector (which just says "render this as emoji"), then a ZWJ, then the preexisting trans symbol ⚧️ [U-26A7 MALE WITH STROKE AND MALE AND FEMALE SIGN], then another emoji selector. So it's actually five characters, and your browser is trying very hard to render it as one. or two, depending.

I JUST WANT IT TO WORK. I know why it doesn't, and unicode is hard, but still. I want trans flags everywhere and everyday and in everything I type. my keyboard should have a trans flag button. in fact, why haven't I made that yet? time to order a custom keycap and get to programming.

[sucka99]

[hbmmaster]

what is your least favourite unicode character?

U+0149 ʼn LATIN SMALL LETTER N PRECEDED BY APOSTROPHE

[lady-inkyrius]

Everytime I remember that Symbols for Legacy Computing Supplement will exist come September life becomes a little bit more worth living.

[superlinguo]

New gesture Emoji in Unicode 15.1: Head Shaking Horizontally and Head Shaking Vertically (aka shake and nod!), and (finally) right facing emoji

Unicode 15.1 will be rolling out to phones and computers across this year. It will include lots of new CJK (Chinese Japanese Korean) ideographs, some new line-breaking rules for syllabic scripts, and a handfull of new emoji! There's a phoenix, a breaking chain, a lime and a brown mushroom, as well as new family silhouettes and a handful of existing emoji, but now facing rightward!

Below are illustrations of the set from a recent Emojipedia summary of the 15.1 update.

The two emoji I'm most excited about are Head Shaking Horizontally and Head Shaking Vertically. That's head shaking and head nodding to you! I wrote these proposals with Jennifer Daniel and the Unicode emoji subcomittee team.

Why the more elaborate names? Well, Unicode tend to describe emoji by form, not function. That's for very good reason, because a head nod might be agreement for you, but in other cultures a vertical movement of the head can mean disagreement. This has provided a double challenge for emoji designers, who have to both show movement and also facial features that aren't too positive or negative. Below are the Emojipedia pair. They've done a great job.

These two emoji are actually made by combining a classic emoji face wtih the horizontal (🙂‍↔️) or vertical arrows (🙂‍↕️ ) using a special Unicode character called a Zero Width Joiner (ZWJ, 'zwidge' to it's friends), which means that even though they're two characters they smoosh together to create one emoji. It's the same process that makes all the different flags, as well as the gender and skin tones.

In fact, all of the emoji in 15.1 are combinations using the ZWJ mechanism; including the phoenix (🐦‍🔥), lime (🍋‍🟩) and brown mushroom (🍄‍🟫 ). Those new right-facing emoji are a combination of the usual left-facing emoji and a rightward arrow🚶‍➡️ .

It's exciting that Unicode have decided to try this set of right-facing characters. Many emoji are left-facing, which is a legacy of their Japanese origins (the word order in Japan means that right-facing makes sense). I've been complaining about emoji directionality since 2015, and I'm glad that this update will mean that lil emoji dude can finally escape a burning building for those of us with a left-to-right writing system and Subject Verb Object word order. They've started with a bunch of people in motion. It will be interesting to see if this set is where it stops or not.

(no no buddy!! To the exit!!)

The use of the ZWJ is an elegant solution because it means that you don't have to make a whole new codepoint for the emoji, it just uses the old one. If someone doesn't have their phone or computer update to 15.1 then it should fall back to just showing 🚶‍➡️, which somewhat conveys the intent. That's the magic of a good ZWJ combination.

Earlier posts on emoji gesture

Gesture emoji: contributing to the Unicode standard

New Publication: The Past and Future of Hand Emoji

Gender Variations for Person in Suit Levitating Emoji - Emoji Proposal

New draft emoji include 3 proposals I co-wrote!

Emoji as Digital Gestures in Language@Internet [Open Access]

Earlier posts on emoji directionality

Emoji Deixis: When emoji don’t face the way you want them to

Don’t run towards the fire (the on-going problem with emoji directions)

[janmisali]

imagine a 21-round poll tournament for every unicode codepoint. not just the ones that are assigned, the whole thing. all 2^21 of them.