Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

> Unicode specifically states that it doesn't define the semantics of characters.

The Unicode Standard explicitly says otherwise:

> Characters have well-defined semantics. These semantics are defined by explicitly assigned character properties, rather than implied through the character name or the position of a character in the code tables (see Section 3.5, Properties). [1]

> The Unicode Standard associates a rich set of semantics with characters and, in some instances, with code points. The support of character semantics is required for conformance; see Section 3.2, Conformance Requirements. [2]

To be fair, it refers to "character" semantics which is more or less abstracted by character properties. It is not like that, for example, △ U+25B2 WHITE UP-POINTING TRIANGLE UNICODE CHARACTER can only ever be used for denoting triangles. But it has defined semantics in the way that the character has properties expected for such symbols.

[1] https://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode14.0.0/ch02.pdf#page...

[2] https://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode14.0.0/ch04.pdf#page...



Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: