[Octave-bug-tracker] [bug #57103] Support Unicode mathematical symbols as function and variable names

[Andrew Janke]

Follow-up Comment #6, bug #57103 (project octave):

This is a really interesting idea. As a software engineer and maintainer, I
hate it. But as a data analyst who sometimes names variables stuff like
"delta_vee" and "sigma_prime", it's really intriguing.

It opens up a bunch of issues with:
a) different Unicode characters that look like each other
b) font support for non-basic-English characters
c) input methods for non-basic-English characters
d) support for source code file encoding detection/configuration in the first
place
e) ugh, that "prime" character looks just like the "transpose" operator or a
single-quote but would be a normal identifier component, and double-prime
looks just like double-quotes
f) same with "mathematical times" and its siblings: unless we introduce syntax
for new operator classes, "A×B" is a single token that's treated as an
identifier, not equivalent to "A × B".
g) Unicode normalization issues
h) accessibility issues
i) weird injection-attack security issues?

Given that Octave tends to support older OS versions (esp. Linux) for a long
time (relevant for b and c), and I don't think we have anyone with enough
Unicode expertise to properly define the character classes that would be
appropriate to use for identifiers etc., I suspect that doing this right now
would just open a big bag of hurt. But it's sure interesting to think about
for the future.

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