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Info

On the Wikipedia page, "Unicode Subscripts and Superscripts", it says in the section, Other Superscript and Subscript Characters,

Consolidated, the Unicode standard defines ... a full superscript Latin lowercase alphabet except q (a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p r s t u v w x y z) [and] ... a few subscripted lowercase letters (a e h i j k l m n o p r s t u v x) ...

However, the Superscripts and Subscripts block leaves out the following letters:

  • Superscript: a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, j, k, l, m, o, p, r, s, t, u, v, w, x, y, z

  • Subscript: b, c, d, f, g, i, j, r, u, v

Query

  1. Why are so many letters not shown in the Superscripts and Subscripts block if they're supposedly included in Unicode?

  2. Why is it that the Latin letter, ə Schwa, was included in said block but not shown on the Wikipedia page?

SarahofGaia
  • 319

1 Answers1

7

Short answer

Don't rely on Wikipedia.

Why are so many letters not shown in the Superscripts and Subscripts block if they're supposedly included in Unicode?

Only the most commonly needed subscript characters are in the “Superscripts and subscripts” block.

Why is it that the Latin letter, ə Schwa, was included in said block but not shown on the Wikipedia page?

Wikipedia is not a standard. You should look at the Unicode Standards for definitive references/answers.

  • Wikipedia is not always correct. It's a good reference but you have to cross-validate with other sources (like real standards).

  • The Wikipedia page explicitely says:

    • "This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (August 2010)
    • This article may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. No cleanup reason has been specified. Please help improve this article if you can. (August 2010)". That means that people are already aware it is not a good reference page (yet)

ə is included in the Unicode Standard Superscripts and Subscripts:

Superscripts and Subscripts: Range: 2070–209F

This file contains an excerpt from the character code tables and list of character names for The Unicode Standard, Version 8.0

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UTF8 symbols for subscript letters

The authoritative reference on what characters there are in Unicode is the Unicode Standard. You can find the relevant information in the PDF code charts. The most commonly needed subscript characters are in the “Superscripts and subscripts” block. To get a full list, check the Unicodedata.txt file and search for characters with <sub> in their description. Beware that many of them are for specialized used, e.g. in phonetic notations, and may work poorly outside such usage, if the glyphs have been designed for the special use.

Source: Stackoverflow answer UTF8 symbols for subscript letters by Jukka K. Korpela

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DavidPostill
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