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Sir, Please Step Away from the ASR-33 (2010)

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Re: Sir, Please Step Away from the ASR-33 (2010)

#271

Post by slver »

Avamander wrote: post #103
slver wrote: post #88

The article's argument in a nutshell: We need to break free from the tyranny of the characters on our keyboard, and express ourselves using characters not on our keyboard. So I hope you see why that argument keeps failing.

Your keyboard is not my keyboard, nor everybody else's. So I hope you see how US-centric your view is.

I've never been to the US.

Before you hurl incorrect accusations at others, check out how international keyboards look. All have QWERTY-like (in some cases AZERTY etc. but still similar) layout as a BASE, and the local characters are on top of that. Yes even in China, Japan, Russia, Greece, Bulgaria, Macedonia and so on.

This is why languages center around this charset, and why it'll stay like that.

Re: Sir, Please Step Away from the ASR-33 (2010)

#272

Post by creata »

stevefolta wrote: post #264
creata wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For anyone on Vim, you can insert lots of special characters by hitting Ctrl+K: =3 is ≡, -> is →, l* is λ, M- is —, etc. You can also run :dig! to see a list of all digraphs, and :help digraph for information on how to define your own.

You can also use ^VuXXXX to insert characters by the hex Unicode value. I find that handy sometimes.

And you can put %B in your status line to show the Unicode value of what's under your cursor.

Re: Sir, Please Step Away from the ASR-33 (2010)

#273

Post by zelphirkalt »

jfk13 wrote: post #98
zelphirkalt wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, cool function that I did not know about before, thank you! Any idea, why it does not list all unicode characters? For example, if I search for what charmap shows me as description of "你", "you, second person pronoun", then the results in Emacs are empty.

Presumably the lookup is based on Unicode character names. The name of "你" is CJK UNIFIED IDEOGRAPH-4F60. Charmap must be showing you information from some sort of dictionary entry or similar, but that's not part of the identity or name of the Unicode character, any more than the name of the Unicode character U+0049 "I" is "first person singular pronoun" (it's actually named LATIN CAPITAL LETTER I); that's just what…

That makes sense. A character might mean one thing in one language and another in another language.

Even when I enter "4F60" it does not show up. Seems some ranges are missing.

Re: Sir, Please Step Away from the ASR-33 (2010)

#274

Post by Avamander »

dcolkitt wrote: post #107
Avamander wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Would you similarly oppose the requirement that all civil aviation globally be done in English on the grounds of “cultural imperialism”? Do you think that every pilot on earth always speaks only English? No. People should have the choice not to speak English and write their alphabets if they wish. Enforcing ASCII on code is like enforcing ASCII on URIs, e-mail addresses. Unnecessarily restrictive to the rest of the…

Yes. All civil aviation globally is conducted in English. Becoming a pilot or air traffic controller anywhere in the world requires proficiency.

It requires proficiency when you want to go or receive international, but doesn't enforce it as the single language that could ever be used, e.g. domestically. There's no point in pretending there's some magic filter that would enforce it.

Re: Sir, Please Step Away from the ASR-33 (2010)

#275

Post by Avamander »

euffs wrote: post #127
Avamander wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your keyboard is not my keyboard, nor everybody else's. So I hope you see how US-centric your view is.

Did you just call Latin on keyboards "US-centric"? How exactly do you think someone, say, in Russia, types their Gmail address in a form? I feel you're the one accidentally revealing US-centric views.

Yes.

> How exactly do you think someone, say, in Russia, types their Gmail address in a form?

They switch their keyboard to Latin, from Cyrillic. They probably prefer mail.ru though, because of such stupid limitations.

Nice try though.

Re: Sir, Please Step Away from the ASR-33 (2010)

#276

Post by Avamander »

slver wrote: post #271
Avamander wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your keyboard is not my keyboard, nor everybody else's. So I hope you see how US-centric your view is.

I've never been to the US. Before you hurl incorrect accusations at others, check out how international keyboards look. All have QWERTY-like (in some cases AZERTY etc. but still similar) layout as a BASE, and the local characters are on top of that. Yes even in China, Japan, Russia, Greece, Bulgaria, Macedonia and so on. This is why languages center around this charset, and why it'll stay like that.

> All have QWERTY-like (in some cases AZERTY etc. but still similar) layout as a BASE.

But not the Latin charset as the single one that can be entered. Let's pick a random one on your list, Russia for example. Funny thing appears, it's clear that you haven't visited Russia for example, hint: Cyrillic on keyboards. Shall we continue? ASCII is not the world's default and never should be.

And incorrect? No, maybe I should've just said narrow-minded instead of American.

Re: Sir, Please Step Away from the ASR-33 (2010)

#277

Post by Avamander »

lolinder wrote: post #113
Avamander wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was the default for me.

That it was your default doesn't mean it was everyone's. OP's argument is that programmers should make it easy for someone else to change their code. It doesn't matter what your defaults were, it matters what the defaults of the next maintainer are.

Glad you understand why there's no need to restrict everyone to US-ASCII.

Re: Sir, Please Step Away from the ASR-33 (2010)

#278

Post by Avamander »

foobarchu wrote: post #187
Avamander wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, go start using metric in the US.

That's the inverse. What we're talking about with keyboards is the opposite, some are advocating for more division. That's like starting a movement for scientists worldwide (who unflinchingly use metric even in the US, as far as I'm aware) to ditch metric and start using the standard units that were historically common in their culture. And for what it's worth, I've never talked to a person who doesn't agree that the…

And you don't see how "inertia" actually applies to both of those directions?

The nuances if the states could or should switch are irrelevant, but the response demonstrated the point perfectly.

Re: Sir, Please Step Away from the ASR-33 (2010)

#279

Post by apricot »

adkadskhj wrote: post #216
voldacar wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some other people in this thread suggested having a keyboard with little e-ink displays on the keycaps. Then the character map could be completely user-defined. Then you could just have a big bank of keys off to the side to select your desired set of characters, i.e. greek, math, emoji etc. You can already sort of do this in software, but you have to manually remember the location of every character in each extra map…

Well damn. I don't have a dog in this fight but boy oh boy do i want that keyboard now. The possibilities of every key being changed to match context sounds awesome. Especially since i love modal editors with visible prompts. Vim/Kakoune users could have their help menu _be_ the keyboard. Every action changes all of your keys to whatever is possible. Sort of mind blowing. Come to think of it, i bet someone has done t…

I remember 14 years ago salivating at the Optimus Maximus keyboard from Art. Lebedev studios: https://www.artlebedev.com/optimus/maximus/

Re: Sir, Please Step Away from the ASR-33 (2010)

#280

Post by account42 »

Symbiote wrote: post #118
ttt0 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Tower of Babel. If the source code is proprietary or for education then it doesn't matter, but for the open source world it'd mean division onto multiple different languages where no one can understand and learn from each other. No one is going to learn 5 different alphabets and 12 different languages just so they can understand the source code.

There is already open source software written in other languages. Sometimes identifiers and comments are transliterated into ASCII, sometimes they remain in the original script. Of course, they won't get many contributions from English speakers. They will get more contributions from speakers of that language. That decision is for the project to make, not others to impose.

> They will get more contributions from speakers of that language.

Will they?

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