> My point here is that if we once start on encoding subscript letters > used in specialist scientific notation, there is no easy place to stop. > Either we need to accept the principle that subscripts are encodable and > set aside space for a whole alphabet of them (and an upper case alphabet > and a Greek alphabet as well, plus punctuation); or else we need to say > from the start that these things are not plain text and should not be > encoded in Unicode.
An excellent argument, here. If we really need subscripts to work with various notational systems which can use arbitrary base characters, why not encoding instead a subscript modifier as a diacritic coded after the base character it modifies to make it a subscript? Then why not superscripts as well? So unless it is used for some internationally approved and widely used notation (IPA is such one) I see little application of encoding some separate characters for very specific notational system... Imagine what would happen if one requested the same subscripts for Han studies?
