Missing Latin superscript lowercase letters

[Kent Karlsson]

> 25 mars 2023 kl. 22:34 skrev Asmus Freytag via Unicode <unicode at corp.unicode.org>:
> 
>> >for unit symbols. When used with temperature, it's interesting to note that not all temperature
>> >scales use it consistently. You don't see it with Fahrenheit very often, for example, reflecting
>> >differences in traditional keyboard layouts.
>>  
>> Ok, let’s digress a bit… I do see that too, in news articles (in web apps) from USA and British news
>> companies and see also “C” when degrees Celsius is meant. But writing farad (F) or coulomb (C)
>> when referring to temperature is just horrible, and only embarrassing for the journalist who wrote
>> that. (Another related horror is “kph”, and there you cannot even blame keyboard layouts.)
> I think it goes a bit too far to assume that any and all unit abbreviations have to be in the SI notation always.
> 
Unit designations are not abbreviations. They are mathematical symbols, like ”lim”, ”sin”, ”arctan”, ”∫”, ”+”, ”24”, … And they participate in arithmetic/math expressions, like division, multiplication (including integer powers), and multiplication with numerical constants (like ”42.5”) and variables. While it is permissible to, say, write ”sns” instead of ”sin” for the sinus function, it is not a great idea to do so. Even worse would be to write ”lim” instead of ”sin” for the sinus function (which is directly comparable to the example with units above).

The SI symbols are standardized, in a standard I’d say is the most important in the modern world. More important than Unicode/10646… It is a bit odd that representatives of a rather important IT standard does not recognize the importance of the most important, overall, standard in the world today (and for foreseeable future).
> I'm sure there are places where there are regulations that define the use of specific abbreviations and in any contexts where they apply to SI, you would be free to read "k" as kilo and "kph" as kilo-ph (and then reject that as undefined). The same is not true for ordinary everyday usage in places where SI units aren't customary. 
> Likewise, the "ph" suffix to mean "per hour" is well established in places, while "/h" is not. That said, given that usage, I'd personally prefer kmph  over kph.
> 
I have never seen ”p” as the division operator in a properly formed mathematical expression. Permitted? Yes, of course. But ”rare and unusual”, and definitely a bad idea.

> For example, in the weather forecast, 80F never refers to capacity, is understood by the audience, and therefore there's no objection to that usage on ground of confusion with SI units.

That is not it. The thing is to keep with conventional, even standardised, notation or not. Even when keeping with conventional notation for units, there are ambiguities that need to be resolved by context: e.g. is B bel or byte? With a prefix (at a minimum, usually there is much more context), the ambiguity is resolved, there are no decibyte nor any megabinarybel (theoretically, there is megabel, but in practice not). If widening to chemistry, B could stand for boron; while not a unit of measure, it will have the same style as a (properly written) unit symbol. But there is no need to diverge from standard (pun intended) practice just because resolution by context is possible for the divergent notation.

Your example is just like if one were to use V for hydrogen, just because one would know from a particular context that hydrogen is meant and not vanadium. I think if anyone were to write V and mean hydrogen, there would be heavy criticism.

True, people may err in various ways. But I’m referring to people who should know better, like w.r.t. temperature: journalists and weather presenters.

(Nit: I’ve even seen F° and C°, which looks even more, ummm, uneducated. And that in a worldwide well-known weather app. Go find! :-) They use technology from another company that gives prognosis for the amount of dandruff in the air… (but not in English). To make the whole thing even more comical, they pride themselves of being sooo accurate… Two all-year-round April’s fools jokes :-).)

> However, usage is not consistent, you see it both with and without the degree sign, and without naming names, websites by academic institutions are just as likely to leave it off as popular websites are likely to add it.
> 
> As you can see, actual usage is all over the place and as Unicode is not prescriptive, we simply deal with what's out there.

But you do complain when things ”out there” are not up to par. Like in the ZWJ discussion not long ago.


/Kent K

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