[Python-ideas] Non-ASCII in Python syntax? [was: Null coalescing operator]

[tritium-list at sdamon.com]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Python-ideas [mailto:python-ideas-bounces+tritium-
> list=sdamon.com at python.org] On Behalf Of Paul Moore
> Sent: Sunday, October 30, 2016 8:22 AM
> To: Stephen J. Turnbull <turnbull.stephen.fw at u.tsukuba.ac.jp>
> Cc: Python-Ideas <python-ideas at python.org>
> Subject: Re: [Python-ideas] Non-ASCII in Python syntax? [was: Null
> coalescing operator]
> 
> 
> My point wasn't so much about dealing with the character set of
> Unicode, as it was about physical entry of non-native text. For
> example, on my (UK) keyboard, all of the printed keycaps are basically
> used. And yet, I can't even enter accented letters from latin-1 with a
> standard keypress, much less extended Unicode. Of course it's possible
> to get those characters (either by specialised mappings in an editor,
> or by using an application like Character Map) but there's nothing
> guaranteed to work across all applications. That's a hardware and OS
> limitation - the hardware only has so many keys to use, and the OS
> (Windows, in my case) doesn't support global key mapping (at least not
> to my knowledge, in a user-friendly manner - I'm excluding writing my
> own keyboard driver :-)) My interest in East Asian experience is at
> least in part because the "normal" character sets, as I understand it,
> are big enough that it's impractical for a keyboard to include a
> plausible basic range of characters, so I'm curious as to what the
> physical process is for typing from a vocabulary of thousands of
> characters on a sanely-sized keyboard.
> 

Just picking a nit, here, windows will happily let you do silly things like hook 14 keyboards up and let you map all of emoji to them.  Sadly, this requires lua.

> In mentioning emoji, my main point was that "average computer users"
> are more and more likely to want to use emoji in general applications
> (emails, web applications, even documents) - and if a sufficiently
> general solution for that problem is found, it may provide a solution
> for the general character-entry case. (Also, I couldn't resist the
> irony of using a :-) smiley while referring to emoji...) But it may be
> that app-specific solutions (e.g., the smiley menu in Skype) are
> sufficient for that use case. Or the typical emoji user is likely to
> be using a tablet/phone rather than a keyboard, and mobile OSes have
> included an emoji menu in their on-screen keyboards.
> 
> Coming back to a more mundane example, if I need to type a character
> like é in an email, I currently need to reach for Character Map and
> cut and paste it. The same is true if I have to type it into the
> console. That's a sufficiently annoying stumbling block that I'm
> inclined to avoid it - using clumsy workarounds like referring to "the
> OP" rather than using their name. I'd be fairly concerned about
> introducing non-ASCII syntax into Python while such stumbling blocks
> remain - the amount of code typed outside of an editor (interactive
> prompt, emails, web applications like Jupyter) mean that editor-based
> workarounds like custom mappings are only a partial solution.
> 
> But maybe you are right, and it's just my age showing. The fate of APL
> probably isn't that relevant these days :-) (or ☺ if you prefer...)
> 
> Paul
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