Multibyte Character Surport for Python

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

>>>>> "Alex" == Alex Martelli <aleax at aleax.it> writes:

    Alex> But I still say "allegretto ma non troppo" in the field of
    Alex> music, "ils sont fous ces Romains" when I read Asterix
    Alex> comics (in the original -- why use translations when I'm
    Alex> lucky enough to be able to enjoy the original French), and
    Alex> "flip-flop" (rather than "multioscillatore bistabile") in
    Alex> electronic circuits.

And so do my Japanese students, at least for "allegretto" and
"flip-flop"---because those are _Japanese words_.

My students are mostly what we call "bunka-kei" (what Americans would
call the "arts" side of "arts and sciences"); they hate math and the
idea that you tell the computer what to do rather than the other way
around is quite a shock.

But one thing they can all do is write Japanese in "Roma characters"
---and they do.  In their programs.  Universally (required course),
except for a very few who intend to go into either foreign companies
or foreign graduate schools.  And the bunka-kei all hate programming.

Not to mention that when they _do_ use English words for identifiers,
they're often semantically incorrect (because Japanese has altered the
meaning since borrowing them)!  And highly prone to typos, because
students often forget whether they wrote the English spelling or some
Japanese approximation when they introduced the identifier.

Is it really so wrong to give my students a language where they're
able to use words that encourage comfortable expression?  That don't
forcibly remind them that this is an alien activity from outer space?
Given that most of them are not going to write programs again for many
years?  And the ones that do are going to proceed to write programs
using Japanese identifiers _anyway_ (unless they're lucky enough to
have you or somebody like you around to enforce sane practices)?

    Alex> It matters not a whit *WHICH* language it is, it does matter
    Alex> that it be ONE language, not hundreds and thousands.  In
    Alex> practice that one language isn't Latin any more (in most
    Alex> fields of endeavour) but English.  Fine, whatever.  As long
    Alex> as it's ONE.

Agreed.  Except that a decade from now Chinese might be the ONE.  Then
we'll be glad we have hanzi identifiers, as Python sweeps the CJK
world.<0.9 wink>

    Alex> Whatever I can do (which is not much at all) against
    Alex> anything furthering the _fragmentation_ (as opposed to,
    Alex> cultural diversity within helpful and peaceful cooperation,
    Alex> which is *great*!) of humanity, I will.  I am convinced that
    Alex> encouraging the use of a zillion different nautral languages
    Alex> in programs is a terrible idea

Agreed, but ...

    Alex> and I earnestly hope Python does nothing at all to _help_ it.

... is it really worth sacrificing the ability to introduce more
non-programmers to programming to avoid "helping fragmentation" by
25% over what those who want localized identifiers already can do?

-- 
Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences     http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp
University of Tsukuba                    Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN