Origin of the U+nnnn notation (original) (raw)

Next message: Kenneth Whistler: "Re: Origin of the U+nnnn notation"

I think that is simply an oversight and should be corrected, since in
English it would not include zero.

Mark

Guy Steele wrote:

>
> On Nov 8, 2005, at 10:52 PM, Philippe Verdy wrote:
>
>> From: "Guy Steele" <Guy.Steele@sun.com>
>>
>>>> A positive value too. Zero is both negative and positive.
>>>>
>>>>
>>> That is not the mathematically conventional use of those terms;
>>> rather, zero is neither negative nor positive. That is why we use the
>>> terms nonnegative (to mean "zero or positive") and nonpositive
>>> (to mean "zero or negative").
>>>
>>
>> That's the conventional mathematical use of the term positive, as I
>> learnt it. To say not null, I learnt "strictly positive", and never
>> "non-negative". This may be cultural differences here (I'm in
>> France, the terms were actually in French). But there are much
>> enough mathematical demonstrationsand definitions of variables that
>> use "positive" inclusively. We could also say "positive or null" but
>> this is generally not necessary.
>>
>
>> Okay, fair enough. (I am no expert in French, but of course
>
> I respect the work and usage of French mathematicians.
> I consulted a standard English dictionary, Merriam-Webster's
> Tenth Collegiate, before making my remark, and the
> Mathematical Dictionary by James and James agrees,
> so I stand by my remarks about the technical meanings of
> the terms in English. I refrain from citing the Wikipedia!)
>
> ObUnicode: At http://www.unicode.org/Public/UNIDATA/UCD.html
> we read the description of field 8 in UnicodeData.txt:
>
> (8) If the character has the numeric property, as specified in
> Chapter 4
> of the Unicode Standard, the value of that character is
> represented with
> an positive or negative integer or rational number in this field.
>
> [Yes, "an" positive, sic.] The author of this text seems to assume that
> "positive or negative" includes zero, inasmuch as U+0030, for example,
> has the value 0 in field 8. (I would have written "with a (possibly
> signed)
> integer or rational number" and then given the three examples of
> U+0035 DIGIT FIVE having value 5, U+1946 LIMBU DIGIT ZERO having
> value 0, and U+0F33 TIBETAN DIGIT HALF ZERO having value -1/2.)
>
> --Guy Steele
>
>
>
>
>

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