Recycling symbols

Sun Apr 20 13:24:57 CDT 2025

On 4/20/2025 12:43 AM, Piotr Karocki via Unicode wrote:
> Seems like writing proposal is harder than I thought :)
Yes. it's a bit of work, but remember, once a character is encoded, it 
is forever. That means that it is worthwhile to spend a bit of time at 
the start to get it right. Even if that can be a bit frustrating.
> I just wanted to propose extending list of recycling symbols to meet EU
> codes, see e.g.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recycling_codes

You are part of the way there. You have already collected a nice set of 
references that point to these things being defined in regulations.

In some cases, the version you cite is the original edition from 1994. 
However, the notes indicate that some revisions took place in 2018.

Your task goes beyond collecting a bibliography like this. You need to 
cite individual passages, with images as appropriate. If you can, it 
would be appropriate to show some examples where these appear in print, 
not just embossed in the container. This serves two purposes: to 
document that these can be considered "text" and that there is evidence 
that the regulation is effective.

> or, in "more legal act",
> https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:31997D0129
> (look into PDF file) - table of numbers and abbreviations,
> and
> https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/1994/62/oj/eng, Annex 1:
> «The identification marks shall appear in the centre of or below the
> graphical marking indicating the reusable or recoverable nature of the
> packaging.»
>
> I thing best solution would be only "triangle" with digits, no abbreviation
> (it can be added using normal letters). And best of best, as "combining
> recycling triangle", if such combining is possible (probably it is not
> possible).

Finally, you need to address the issue of what should be encoded in 
plain text.

For example, the triangle symbol with an abbreviation below is 
potentially not something that should be expressed in plain text. The 
main reason would be that the abbreviations are potentially open ended, 
so that they are best encoded as text strings. The 2D placement would 
then be a matter of a higher level format protocol.

Something similar applies to multi-digit and other strings ("ABS", 
"ALU") enclosed in the triangle.

The problem with either approach is that there isn't a generic protocol 
which can define 2D layout in such a way that the resulting shape works 
like a symbol in text. The big exception here would be mathematical 
layout. However, as attractive as that would seem, it's not really 
possible to treat the recycling symbol as a math operator which can take 
"arguments" like the Summation or Integral signs.

If we had math mode, we could write $♺(21)(PAP)$ to get , using the 
notation of UTN#28 (https://www.unicode.org/notes/tn28/)

Something like this would be much preferable over giving some character 
code strange behavior in plain text.

Since the first seven symbols have been encoded for many years now, it 
may be possible to do a search on them to see whether they are in fact 
used in text and how widely. This information could inform decision 
making on the best encoding model.

Here is the result of one such search. It appears that the symbol in 
question is used like a dingbat or emoji more often than in its indended 
function. But it's not clear that this is the best way to search.

A proposal that contains detailed research (including relevant excerpts 
that don't require the reader to follow a link) including demonstrated 
in-text usage, combined with careful presentation of several encoding 
options with pros and cons, would have the best chance of being 
seriously considered.

A./

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Peter Constable [mailto:pgcon6 at msn.com]
> Sent: Saturday, 19 April 2025 22:44
> To: Piotr Karocki;unicode at corp.unicode.org
> Subject: RE: Recycling symbols
>
> If you want to find a proposal for a character, one thing you can do is use
> search. For example, try searching for "recycling" using one of the search
> options on this page:
>
> https://www.unicode.org/search/
>
> Another thing you can do is to determine the age of the character (what
> version it was added in) — you can see that for 2673 using the character
> properties utility:
>
> https://util.unicode.org/UnicodeJsps/character.jsp?a=2673&B1=Show
>
> That shows that U+2673 was added in Unicode 3.2. Then you can go to this
> page to find out what year that version was published:
>
> https://www.unicode.org/versions/enumeratedversions.html
>
> There we see that Unicode 3.2 was published in 2002. So, then you can do to
> the UTC document registry
>
> https://www.unicode.org/L2/
>
> and start searching in the index pages from 2002 and earlier. Doing that,
> you'll find three documents with "recycling" in their titles in 2001 that
> are all discussing the characters in process of being encoded:
>
> https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2001/Register-2001.html
>
> And you'll find the original proposal in 2000:
>
> https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2000/Register-2000.html
>
>
> Peter
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Unicode<unicode-bounces at corp.unicode.org> On Behalf Of Piotr Karocki
> via Unicode
> Sent: April 18, 2025 12:48 PM
> To:unicode at corp.unicode.org
> Subject: Recycling symbols
>
> Hi,
>   there are recycling symbols in Unicode (U+2673 to U+2679, RECYCLING SYMBOL
> FOR TYPE-1 PLASTICS to RECYCLING SYMBOL FOR TYPE-7 PLASTICS).  ♳ ♴ ♵ ♶ ♷ ♸
> ♹.
>   But currently there are more recycling symbols in use, not only 1 to 7, but
> also two digits numbers.
>
>   How can I find original proposal of including symbols U+2673 to U+2679? I
> want to simply extend it to new numbers, but use original rationale etc.
>
>   By the way, can Unicode encode e.g. "combining recycling symbol" (something
> like U+2672), combined with TWO digits?
>
>
> ---8<---
> Piotr Karocki
>
> Wszystko co jest poniżej jest samowolnym dopiskiem Google
>
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