Bill Baxter wrote:
On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 7:27 AM, Andrei Alexandrescu
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Please vote up before the haters take it down, and discuss:
http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/78rjk/allowing_unicode_operators_in_d_similarly_to/
(My comment cross posted here from reddit)
I think the right way to do it is not to make everything Unicode. All
the pressure on the existing symbols would be dramatically relieved by
the addition of just a handful of new symbols.
The truth is keyboards aren't very good for inputting Unicode. That
isn't likely to change. Yes they've dealt with the problem in Asian
languages by using IMEs but in my opinion IMEs are horrible to use.
Some people seem to argue it's a waste to go to Unicode only for a few
symbols. If you're going to go Unicode, you should go whole hog. I'd
argue the exact opposite. If you're going to go Unicode, it should be
done in moderation. Use as little Unicode as necessary and no more.
I agree.
There is in fact a fairly defensible subset of Unicode: those characters
which are easy to type on some keyboard. This would includes chevrons,
currency symbols (especially pound, euro, yen); european accented
characters (not terribly useful) and a couple of other punctuation
marks. After all, if it's painful to type a Euro symbol on your
keyboard, you're heading for oblivion.
The list is pretty much equivalent to the US-International keyboard
layout in Windows. There aren't many useful characters in there, but it
might be enough.
« » ¿ ¡ ¶ § ¬ × ÷ ¤ £ ¥ € ¢ © ®
The chevrons and the inverted ? and ! are perhaps the most interesting,
since they are paired. The multiply sign isn't bad, though.
With the German keyboards I have to use, some of these are less painful
to type than {}.
