On Monday, 7 March 2016 at 07:58:53 UTC, Era Scarecrow wrote:
On Monday, 7 March 2016 at 06:57:48 UTC, Ola Fosheim Grøstad
wrote:
immutable π = 3.14;
Oh, the horror!
With the assumption pi is declared elsewhere (say, in
std.math), what i wonder is the number for pi vs 2 letters.
Unicode 03C0h, so now i have to convert that to decimal, code
960. Alt+960 = └
That's not pi... Looking up the symbol by itself in the
character map was annoying enough. No, this is not a good idea
unless it's easily accessible, preferably with 2 or fewer
keystrokes to symbolize pi.
As a reminder most of us are programmers, not scientists or
mathematicians. Having specialized symbols won't give us any
benefit. It's not like we're filling out a complex formula with
college level math for a thesis.
Have you ever heard of .XCompose?
For linux: https://github.com/kragen/xcompose
For windows: https://github.com/samhocevar/wincompose
How it works:
You choose a compose key, then use it to compose special
characters with specific sequences.
Examples:
ComposeKey, *, p: π.
ComposeKey, s, s: ß
ComposeKey, ComposeKey, d, e, g, c (degree Celsius): ℃
It is not impossible to use unicode special characters on a daily
base easily, with the use of this tool. No need to use the
character map or anything.
I think it would be very nice, if one had the option of using
these special characters.
E.g. → instead of >>, if you desire that; std.math defining π as
π.
Small gimmicks like these are things I find to be good for a
language to have.
