Emoji Symbols: Open Issues

L2/08-315
Date: 2008-08-12
Authors: Kat Momoi, Markus Scherer
For the list of related documents see http://sites.google.com/site/unicodesymbols/Home/emoji-symbols

This progress report includes some portions of the feedback document L2/08-106 which was discussed on 2008-02-05 during UTC #114.
Notes from the February meeting are marked in yellow italics, and new discussion notes are marked in blue and prefixed with "TODO:" or "Discuss:".

The updated table is at http://www.unicode.org/~scherer/emoji/table/emoji-20080812.html

Asmus Freytag to the Symbols SC list 2008-02-01:

Also, 5.1 introduces several additional geometric symbols, which could
be mapped, for example the extra large squares.

[Asmus Freytag 20080205:
You also don't appear to have looked at block 2B00 from Unicode 5.1 (which among other symbols should contain an additional pair of squares,

TODO: Have not decided yet on U+2B1B and U+2B1C and their relationships to KDDI 21/22 and KDDI 38/39. (Thanks for pointing out!)

or the
2980 block from Unicode 5.0 (curved arrows).
Doing so, will yield a few additional mappings.]

5) Clock faces, computer/document icons, as well as a rather significant
number of other symbols are present in the suite of wingdings fonts
distributed by Microsoft. A cross mapping to these would be a useful
exercise - not the least because these fonts represent existing black
and white interpretations of the glyph shape(s) for such symbols. These
glyphs might represent possible starting points for representative
glyphs, should these characters be encoded.

[Markus Scherer 20080204: Good suggestion, but not immediately necessary for the discussion of encoding. We will try to cross-map with Wingdings after UTC #114. Volunteers for cross-mapping with Wingdings would be appreciated.] -->nothing to be done for now but action item to cross-map with WingDings

✓
TODO: Cross mapping with WingDings not yet completed.

George Rhoten to the Symbols SC list 2008-02-01:

Your proposal seems to include a lot of stuff that is [...] already in
Unicode without mentioning the appropriate Unicode codepoints [...]

The obvious ones, at least to me, are the characters with an enclosing
circle or box. Plenty of these can be represented with the character
followed by \u20DD or \u20DE. The keypad 0-9, parking sign (\u24C5), and
several other letter signs come to mind as already existing in Unicode.
There are several circled ones in the \u2460-\u24FF block.

[Markus Scherer 20080204:

Keypad symbols: Shift-JIS source separation from U+2460 (Shift-JIS 87 40) etc.
Parking: Different range of glyphs than U+24C5 Circled Latin Capital Letter P
Possible? (Especially unsure about U+20DD Enclosing Circle vs. U+20DE Enclosing Square: For some symbols, carriers' shapes differ.)
Ken: These are styled variants; encoding with combining marks does not express that.
Mark: If we map the Top Secret Sign to a single character, then we should be consistent.
Don't use 20DD/20DE for enclosed letters.

Softbank 183 Here Sign (Koko in square): Is it possible to enclose multiple base character inside U+20DE? →No
KDDI 279 Top Secret Sign ≈ U+79D8 U+20DD? =U+3299?
DoCoMo 345 Prohibited Sign ≈ U+7981 U+20DE?
KDDI 387 Empty Sign ≈ U+7A7A U+20DE?
DoCoMo 347 Passed Sign ≈ U+5408 U+20DE?
KDDI 386 Full Sign ≈ U+6E80 U+20DE?
Softbank 201 Existence Sign ≈ U+6709 U+20DE? =U+3292
Softbank 202 Non-Existence Sign ≈ U+7121 U+20DE?
Softbank 203 Monthly Sign ≈ U+6708 U+20DE? =U+328A (there may be additional characters in the vicinity of U+328A that can be unified with other symbols in question here)
Softbank 204 Application Sign ≈ U+7533 U+20DE?
KDDI 285 Advantage Sign ≈ U+5F97 U+20DD?
KDDI 383 Discount Sign ≈ U+5272 U+20DE?
KDDI 384 Service Sign ≈ U+30B5 U+20DE? =U+32DA?
KDDI 388 Reserved Sign ≈ U+6307 U+20DE?
KDDI 389 In Business Sign ≈ U+55B6 U+20DE?
KDDI 402 Celebration Sign ≈ U+795D U+20DD? =U+3297?
KDDI 506 Accept Sign ≈ U+53EF U+20DD?]

TODO: Need to verify unifications and apply them in the table.
Discuss: Any further feedback on the proposed unifications? Characters like U+3299 are much less styled (they look like the Han characters with enclosing circle) than the symbols in the Emoji context.

The wavy line could be \u3030, \uFE4B or \uFE4F. Maybe there are others.

[Markus Scherer 20080204: DoCoMo 165 & 166 are used like decorative version of U+30FC Prolonged Sound Mark. On reflection, they should be Modifier Letters, not Symbols, therefore DoCoMo 165 Wavy Length Mark is not appropriate for unification with the other wavy dashes etc.]

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Information: Kat Momoi: docomo 165 is used often to elongate a vowel -- I have seen it used for Hiragana but I guess it could be used for Katakana. It seems similar to U+3030 but at this point it has not been mapped to it. Another similar character usage is found with U+FF5E and U+301C.

Decorative length marks (DoCoMo 165 & 166) as Modifier Letters (Lm)?

Decorative punctuation etc. (U+27xx) are just symbols.
Use variation selectors?
Compatibility variants? (Symbols)

Discuss: For these decorative length marks, decide whether to encode a (a) new Modifier Letter (Lm) or (b) using U+30FC with variation selectors. If encoding as new Modifier Letters, then also decide (a1) whether they should have compatibility decompositions to U+30FC.

Page 20, Hand Signal, scissor in hand =U+270C? Victory hand (dingbat)

Discuss: This Emoji is part of a rock-paper-scissors group. Should it be unified with U+270C?

Discuss: We propose adding a "10" character that is to be used with U+20E3 Combining Enclosing Keycap to form keycap 10, consistent with keycaps 0-9.

TODO: Upgrade table production tools to support unification with sequences of existing characters.

TODO: Unifications with Japanese TV (Broadcast) Symbols

TODO: Double-check Emoji vs. standard Shift-JIS source-separation rule.

TODO: Propose code points for new characters, properties, etc.