I need to write unicode characters and diacritics in a web page. They are part of a phonetic alphabet designed for romanist studies (the Bourciez Alphabet). My problem is a display issue, I believe: the character codes are all OK in unicode, but some diacritics are not displayed as expected.
Most notably, the 'COMBINING DOUBLE BREVE BELOW' (U+035C) does not display as expected: it appears not under the 2 letters to which it is supposed to apply, but under the last of those letters and the next character (another letter, or a space).
Here for instance, the combining diacritic should be under the first 2 "a" characters, but it is displayed under the 2nd and 3rd "a"; yet you can see that the combination has been applied to the first 2 "a"s, because they are displayed in smaller size than the normal "a"s:
result of combining double breve below
I'm using fonts which have those characters (I tried Arial MS Unicode, Gentium, and Lucida Sans Unicode). They all have the same display issue.
Any idea how I can solve this issue?
I'm having trouble reproducing the problem. Connecting two characters with the breve diacritic seems to be working for me. First I enter the first character of the pair, then the U+035C character, finally the second and it shows as follows.
sample image
Related
I've seen weirdly formatted text called Zalgo like below written on various forums. It's kind of annoying to look at, but it really bothers me because it undermines my notion of what a character is supposed to be. My understanding is that a character is supposed to move horizontally across a line and stay within a certain "container". Obviously the Zalgo text is moving vertically and doesn't seem to be restricted to any space.
Is this a bug/flaw/exploit/hack in Unicode? Are these individual characters with weird properties? "What" is happening here?
H̡̫̤̤̣͉̤ͭ̓̓̇͗̎̀ơ̯̗̱̘̮͒̄̀̈ͤ̀͡w͓̲͙͖̥͉̹͋ͬ̊ͦ̂̀̚ ͎͉͖̌ͯͅͅd̳̘̿̃̔̏ͣ͂̉̕ŏ̖̙͋ͤ̊͗̓͟͜e͈͕̯̮̙̣͓͌ͭ̍̐̃͒s͙͔̺͇̗̱̿̊̇͞ ̸̤͓̞̱̫ͩͩ͑̋̀ͮͥͦ̊Z̆̊͊҉҉̠̱̦̩͕ą̟̹͈̺̹̋̅ͯĺ̡̘̹̻̩̩͋͘g̪͚͗ͬ͒o̢̖͇̬͍͇͓̔͋͊̓ ̢͈͙͂ͣ̏̿͐͂ͯ͠t̛͓̖̻̲ͤ̈ͣ͝e͋̄ͬ̽͜҉͚̭͇ͅx͎̬̠͇̌ͤ̓̂̓͐͐́͋͡ț̗̹̝̄̌̀ͧͩ̕͢ ̮̗̩̳̱̾w͎̭̤͍͇̰̄͗ͭ̃͗ͮ̐o̢̯̻̰̼͕̾ͣͬ̽̔̍͟ͅr̢̪͙͍̠̀ͅǩ̵̶̗̮̮ͪ́?̙͉̥̬͙̟̮͕ͤ̌͗ͩ̕͡
The text uses combining characters, also known as combining marks. See section 2.11 of Combining Characters in the Unicode Standard (PDF).
In Unicode, character rendering does not use a simple character cell model where each glyph fits into a box with given height. Combining marks may be rendered above, below, or inside a base character
So you can easily construct a character sequence, consisting of a base character and “combining above” marks, of any length, to reach any desired visual height, assuming that the rendering software conforms to the Unicode rendering model. Such a sequence has no meaning of course, and even a monkey could produce it (e.g., given a keyboard with suitable driver).
And you can mix “combining above” and “combining below” marks.
The sample text in the question starts with:
LATIN CAPITAL LETTER H - H
COMBINING LATIN SMALL LETTER T - ͭ
COMBINING GREEK KORONIS - ̓
COMBINING COMMA ABOVE - ̓
COMBINING DOT ABOVE - ̇
Zalgo text works because of combining characters. These are special characters that allow to modify character that comes before.
OR
y + ̆ = y̆ which actually is
y + ̆ = y̆
Since you can stack them one atop the other you can produce the following:
y̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆
which actually is:
y̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆
The same goes for putting stuff underneath:
y̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆
that in fact is:
y̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆
In Unicode, the main block of combining diacritics for European languages and the International Phonetic Alphabet is U+0300–U+036F.
More about it here
To produce a list of combining diacritical marks you can use the following script (since links keep on dying)
for(var i=768; i<879; i++){console.log(new DOMParser().parseFromString("&#"+i+";", "text/html").documentElement.textContent +" "+"&#"+i+";");}
Also check em out
Mͣͭͣ̾ Vͣͥͭ͛ͤͮͥͨͥͧ̾
I came across a piece of text that displays in a mystery font even when you view source in plain text: 𝓦𝓸𝓸𝓭
The word 'Wood' above appears, at least in Chrome, as a sort of caligraphic font when pasted in to Notepad or even the Google search bar.
Have tried to see if its base64 encoded characters, or quoted printable etc
𝓦𝓸𝓸𝓭
Can anyone identify how its done? Can it be done with a different font? Is it cross browser compatible?
Those characters are not being shown in a different font. They're in the same font as the rest of the page source.
The reason why they look strange is that they are not the ordinary letters 'W', 'o' and 'd' represented by the character values 0x57, 0x6f and 0x64. These characters are from the "Mathematical Alphanumeric Symbols" section of the font. Specifically they are the "Mathematical Bold Script Capital W", the "Mathematical Bold Script Small O" and the "Mathematical Bold Script Small D" characters represented by the values 0x1d4e6, 0x1d4f8 and 0x1d4ed. See https://unicode-table.com/en/blocks/mathematical-alphanumeric-symbols/ for a table of the characters in that section.
There's a good chance that any modern browser would show those characters just as you're seeing them. It comes down to whether the font that the browser uses to present the page includes glyphs for those character values.
I'm looking to add two U+0307 COMBINING DOT ABOVE characters to a Cyrillic letter. When added to Latin letters, the dot diacritics stack, but with Cyrillic letters, the first dot is combined with the letter but the second is rendered to the side, as if it were a standalone grapheme! In Python:
The same thing occurs in JavaScript, even in the browser:
Is there a rule that dictates how many diacritics are allowed on a certain base character? Would this be related to font metrics? Or is this effect just a bug? Can it be overridden so that I can see two dots vertically stacked on an э?
I've seen weirdly formatted text called Zalgo like below written on various forums. It's kind of annoying to look at, but it really bothers me because it undermines my notion of what a character is supposed to be. My understanding is that a character is supposed to move horizontally across a line and stay within a certain "container". Obviously the Zalgo text is moving vertically and doesn't seem to be restricted to any space.
Is this a bug/flaw/exploit/hack in Unicode? Are these individual characters with weird properties? "What" is happening here?
H̡̫̤̤̣͉̤ͭ̓̓̇͗̎̀ơ̯̗̱̘̮͒̄̀̈ͤ̀͡w͓̲͙͖̥͉̹͋ͬ̊ͦ̂̀̚ ͎͉͖̌ͯͅͅd̳̘̿̃̔̏ͣ͂̉̕ŏ̖̙͋ͤ̊͗̓͟͜e͈͕̯̮̙̣͓͌ͭ̍̐̃͒s͙͔̺͇̗̱̿̊̇͞ ̸̤͓̞̱̫ͩͩ͑̋̀ͮͥͦ̊Z̆̊͊҉҉̠̱̦̩͕ą̟̹͈̺̹̋̅ͯĺ̡̘̹̻̩̩͋͘g̪͚͗ͬ͒o̢̖͇̬͍͇͓̔͋͊̓ ̢͈͙͂ͣ̏̿͐͂ͯ͠t̛͓̖̻̲ͤ̈ͣ͝e͋̄ͬ̽͜҉͚̭͇ͅx͎̬̠͇̌ͤ̓̂̓͐͐́͋͡ț̗̹̝̄̌̀ͧͩ̕͢ ̮̗̩̳̱̾w͎̭̤͍͇̰̄͗ͭ̃͗ͮ̐o̢̯̻̰̼͕̾ͣͬ̽̔̍͟ͅr̢̪͙͍̠̀ͅǩ̵̶̗̮̮ͪ́?̙͉̥̬͙̟̮͕ͤ̌͗ͩ̕͡
The text uses combining characters, also known as combining marks. See section 2.11 of Combining Characters in the Unicode Standard (PDF).
In Unicode, character rendering does not use a simple character cell model where each glyph fits into a box with given height. Combining marks may be rendered above, below, or inside a base character
So you can easily construct a character sequence, consisting of a base character and “combining above” marks, of any length, to reach any desired visual height, assuming that the rendering software conforms to the Unicode rendering model. Such a sequence has no meaning of course, and even a monkey could produce it (e.g., given a keyboard with suitable driver).
And you can mix “combining above” and “combining below” marks.
The sample text in the question starts with:
LATIN CAPITAL LETTER H - H
COMBINING LATIN SMALL LETTER T - ͭ
COMBINING GREEK KORONIS - ̓
COMBINING COMMA ABOVE - ̓
COMBINING DOT ABOVE - ̇
Zalgo text works because of combining characters. These are special characters that allow to modify character that comes before.
OR
y + ̆ = y̆ which actually is
y + ̆ = y̆
Since you can stack them one atop the other you can produce the following:
y̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆
which actually is:
y̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆
The same goes for putting stuff underneath:
y̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆
that in fact is:
y̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̰̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆̆
In Unicode, the main block of combining diacritics for European languages and the International Phonetic Alphabet is U+0300–U+036F.
More about it here
To produce a list of combining diacritical marks you can use the following script (since links keep on dying)
for(var i=768; i<879; i++){console.log(new DOMParser().parseFromString("&#"+i+";", "text/html").documentElement.textContent +" "+"&#"+i+";");}
Also check em out
Mͣͭͣ̾ Vͣͥͭ͛ͤͮͥͨͥͧ̾
I found some "funny" characters (e.g. ḓ̵̙͎̖̯̞̜̞̪̠ and •̩̩̩̩̩̩̩̩̩̩) in social media that takes more than one line. First I think it is the bug of Firefox. I tried this in Gedit and LibreOffice Writer, they are all the same. So, what is this actually? Actually I am asking about the character encoding and rendering.
I tried to find the character in GNOME Character Map, they could not be found.
I tried to check the character code of both of them in unicode (probably UTF-8). It seems they takes more than one character. How come one character is more than one character? This is the result by using Python.
Character ḓ̵̙͎̖̯̞̜̞̪̠
u'\u2022\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329
\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329\u0329'
Character •̩̩̩̩̩̩̩̩̩̩
u'\u1e13\u0335\u0319\u034e\u0316\u032f\u031e\u031c\u031e\u032a\u0320\u033c\u031e
\u0320\u034e\u033c\u0353\u034b\u036e\u034c\u0346\u0300\u035c\u0345'
U+0329 is COMBINING VERTICAL LINE BELOW. It is a combining character (and so are all the others in there except U+2022 and U+1E13), meaning that it combines with the previous one. What you see here is merely the result of someone stacking way too many combining characters on the same base.