[Python-Dev] Unicode 5.1.0 (original) (raw)

Guido van Rossum guido at python.org
Mon Aug 25 19:56:05 CEST 2008

On Mon, Aug 25, 2008 at 10:52 AM, Benjamin Peterson <musiccomposition at gmail.com> wrote:

On Mon, Aug 25, 2008 at 12:34 PM, Barry Warsaw <barry at python.org> wrote:

On Aug 21, 2008, at 6:30 PM, Terry Reedy wrote:

http://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode5.1.0/ "Unicode 5.1.0 contains over 100,000 characters, and provides significant additions and improvements..." to existing features, including new files and upgrades to existing files. Sounds close to adding features ;-) I agree. This seriously feels like new, potentially high risk code to be adding this late in the game. The BDFL can always override, but unless someone is really convincing that this is low risk high benefit, I'd vote no for 2.6/3.0. +1 Something I think we should also be considering is the 2.7/3.1 release cycle. I propose that we shorten it to ~1 year from 2.6/3.0's release with our main aim being binding 2.x and 3.x more closely. This would get the new unicode features out fairly quickly without having to wait another 2.5 years like 2.5 -> 2.6.

I was never proposing to support any new features in 2.6/3.0. I was only proposing to update the data files that we already support to the versions provided by 5.1.0. Those data files should have the same format, just slightly improved content: some new characters, some corrected properties. Fredrik says it best:

at least two Unicode experts have stated that they don't think the changes are that important. determining exactly what the changes to the core character database was the whole point of my offer to tinker with this.

(I got distracted due to compiler issues and certain other things to be announced later, but I expect to have some results later this week).

-- --Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)

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