On Thursday, March 17, 2016 at 9:34:46 AM UTC-5, wxjm...@gmail.com wrote: > Very simple. Use Python and its (buggy) character encoding > model. How to save memory? It's also very simple. Use a > programming language, which handles Unicode correctly.
I personally don't have much use for Unicode, so i'm not affected by the "buggy encoding model". Outside of posting a "look of disapproval" emoticon on Usenet, or something silly like that, i mostly avoid Unicode like the plague. And if one day Unicode went away, and i could no longer post my silly little emoticon, well, i seriously doubt that the loss would cause me to slash wrists -- boo-hiss! [tangent] I've always found it so silly that people insist on using Unicode chars when ASCII chars will suffice. For example, consider "scare quotes" -- are they really so pedantic that the leading quote must "lean to the left" and the trailing quote must "lean to the right"? Not to mention using the moronic Unicode spaces, etc.. Besides, i've always felt that Unicode was nothing more than a monkey patch to repair the selfish anti-patterns coded into each regional language source. The insistence of some natural languages on using diacritics, as if their users are so stupid, that they cannot remember how to pronounce the words, and therefore must encode a tutorial into the language glpyhs themselves! At best it's fluff, and at worst it's an insult to both the users of said language, and the general intelligence of *ALL* humans. We humans have a tendency to inject chaos into our systems, and the worst part is, the chaos is not accidental, no, it's quite purposeful! The reasons we do these things are varied, but mostly it's just pure selfishness. Some will claim that we should promote "language diversity", and if we're talking about programming languages, then i wholeheartedly agree . But if we're talking about natural languages, then i strongly disagree. I ask: how much productivity has been lost by needing to translate one selfish natural encoding into another? Or how much time has been wasted submitting to the "gods" of internalization and localization? I would argue far too much. But natural language is not the system riddled with overlaps,no, programming languages are guilty of the sin as well. What many people don't understand about my argument, is that, i don't want to create "one language to rule all languages", no, that would only stifle innovation. However, what we should do, is standardized all the "overlapping bits" so that we can focus our energy on the "experimental bits". Instead, we created a culture of "wheel re-inventors". (Of course, whilst re-inventing the wheel will always be a indispensable tool of academic exercise, it should *NEVER* be tolerated in our formal encoding systems) I'll admit I tend to be highly pragmatic, and some have even called me a "minimalist", but i consider neither of these descriptions to be insulting. In fact, i wear them as a badge of honor. In the end: i want to get the job done, as quickly and correctly as possible, without being distracted by the superfluous complexities of "encoded selfishness". We humans are such an inefficient species, and the only reason we've managed to survive on this *ROCK* as long as we have, is simply do to the luck of "drawing the longest intelligent straw". But you see, all quantities are relative, and we would be foolish to assume that the "gold metal of intelligence" that we wear so proudly around our neck, here on earth, would have even a *MODICUM* of significance in the vast expanse of this universe. And even though our intelligence can be applied to many diverse problems, we have a tendency to become mired in emotional tar-pits. Tar pits that did not exist until *WE* created them! Tar pits that serve no function but to retrograde the magnitude of our intelligence evolution vector! What's the point the possessing the most powerful tool in the known universe (the human brain), if we cannot even escape the spectres of our own "mind spooks"? I can easily imagine, that if an advanced intelligence were to observe the behavior and evolutionary path of humans, they would become disgusted with the poor administration of our collective intelligence. generations; centuries; even millennia, have come and gone, but yet we still don't "GET IT"! Our history can succinctly be described as: "jumping from one shampoo-rinse-repeat cycle" to the next, all the while, patting ourselves on the back as if we've achieved "something great". Heck, they may even decide that we should be "put out of our misery" like a horse with a broken leg. So congratulations "earth man"! You've won the "participation trophy". Now go home, place it on your mantle, and bore your grand-kids to death with all the wonderful stories of your "glory days"! And after they are dead and gone, you can bask in the beams of light glimmering from the fake gold-plating on your cheap little plastic trinket, as you wait for *DEATH* to come... [/tangent] In the event that i change my mind about Unicode, and/or for the sake of others, who may want to know, please provide a list of languages that *YOU* think handle Unicode better than Python, starting with the best first. Thanks. -- https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
