New Unicode Character Property EquivalentUnifiedIdeograph

A new character property EquivalentUnifiedIdeograph is proposed for addition to Unicode 10.0. This property associates (where possible) the 365 characters in the CJK Radicals Supplement, Kangxi Radicals, and CJK Strokes blocks to an appropriate CJK Unified Ideograph.

For details of the proposal, a link to the proposed data, and information about how to provide feedback, please see Public Review Issue #344.

Adopt-A-Character Grant to Support Indic Scripts

The Adopt-a-Character program has awarded a grant to support further development of the following four Indic scripts in the Unicode Standard:

• Hanifi Rohingya, a script in current use in Myanmar and Bangladesh
• Nandinagari, a Brahmi-based historic script formerly used in South India
• Old Sogdian, a group of historic scripts formerly used in Kazakhstan, Pakistan, and Western China
• Sogdian, derived from Old Sogdian, a group of historic scripts formerly used in Central Asia

The goal of this grant is to enable the development of encoding proposals that can be included in the Unicode Standard. The work will be done by Anshuman Pandey under the direction of Deborah Anderson (SEI, UC Berkeley) and Rick McGowan (Unicode Consortium).

Proposed Update UTR #51, Unicode Emoji (Version 5.0)

A proposed update of UTR #51, Unicode Emoji (Version 5.0) is available for public review and feedback. This new version adds a mechanism to support regional flags, such as Scotland or California, though the choice of which of these flags to support is left to vendors.

Associated charts are available at http://www.unicode.org/emoji/charts-beta/index.html, and associated data files are available at http://www.unicode.org/Public/emoji/5.0/. This proposed update also has a separate data file for the valid emoji presentation sequences, and reflects a small change in the ordering of SELFIE. The charts also add the newest Apple and Facebook emoji.

At this time, the proposed update does not add any additional recommended emoji zwj sequences, nor reclassify any existing Unicode 9.0 characters as emoji. There are proposals for doing so that will be reviewed in the next Unicode Technical Committee meeting.

The review period for the proposed update ends on January 16, 2017. For further information and instructions on how to provide feedback, please see Public Review Issue #343.

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This holiday season you can give a unique gift by adopting any emoji, letter, or symbol — and help support the Unicode Consortium’s mission to enable all languages to be used on computers. You can now adopt Unicode 9.0 characters and the Emoji 4.0 emoji sequences (such as woman astronaut or rockstar). ​​See the Adopt-a-Character Page.

Support Unicode with an Adopt-a-Character Gift this Holiday Season!

This holiday season you can give a unique gift by adopting any emoji, letter, or symbol — and help support the Unicode Consortium’s mission to enable all languages to be used on computers. ​Three levels of sponsorship​ are available​, starting at $100. With over 128,000 characters to choose from, you are certain to find an appropriate character, for even the most demanding recipient. All sponsors will receive a custom digital badge featuring the adopted character for use on the web and elsewhere. Sponsors at the two highest levels will receive a special thank-you gift engraved with the name you supply and the adopted character.

The program funds work on “digitally disadvantaged” languages, both modern and historic. In 2016 the program awarded a grant to support work on a proposal for the Hanifi Rohingya script. The program has also funded work on Egyptian hieroglyphs and Mayan hieroglyphs.

In its first year, the Adopt-a-Character program has had nearly 400 sponsors. Be part of the next wave, with a worthwhile gift!

For more information on the program, or to adopt a character, see the Adopt-a-Character Page.

113 New Unicode Emoji (plus skin tones)

113 new emoji are now available in UTR #51 Unicode Emoji, Version 4.0. The main focus of this 4.0 release is further enhancing gender representation and professions. These new emoji are already appearing on smart phones and other devices and platforms that support emoji. See the full list in Emoji Recently Added.

The new emoji will soon be available for adoption, helping fund projects to improve language support.

Unlike the 72 emoji characters added to Unicode 9.0 in June, these are not new Unicode characters. Most of these new emoji are sequences of existing emoji, “glued together” with a special invisible character so that they appear and behave like a single character. This glue character is called a ZWJ, pronounced “zwidge” or /zwɪdʒ/. Three existing Unicode 9.0 characters (gender and medical symbols) were changed to qualify as emoji, for use in those ZWJ sequences.

Two of the new sequences are flags, 10 are family groupings (such as mother with daughter), 32 are new professions/roles (such as man or woman astronaut), and 66 are explicit-gendered variants (such as man or woman running). 99 of these sequences, plus 5 other characters (such as snowboarder), can also now have the 5 skin tone modifiers.

The technical documentation has also been updated, with additional guidelines for implementers and the new versions of the emoji data files for use in programs.