Request for /= vs !=

[Fresheyeball]

So in Fira Code != gets you the not equals ligature, but in many of my favorite languages /= means not equals. And while there is a nice ligature for /=, it would be nice to get the not equals ligature for /=.

[weavejester]

Isn't /= used a lot to mean "divide and assign"?

[Fresheyeball]

In most languages, yes /= is "divide and assign", but in some its "not equal to". IE Haskell, which already has great Fira support.

[weavejester]

Right, but that means that in those languages, a /= would be indistinguishable from !=.

[Fresheyeball]

I'm not sure what options are really possible. But one I know for sure, would be to release an alternative version of Fira with ligature configurations relative to the meaning of some languages. There are actually several languages that use /= to mean not equals.

[bootmii]

The /= ligature is ambiguous about its purpose and distinguishes it from !=. Let's keep it that way.

[HolgerPeters]

Indeed, ambiguity must be avoided at all costs. I think in C a /= b != c is a valid statement, it would be terrible if /= was rendered as != (and semantically wrong).

A similar case could be made for <> which also is "not-equal" in some languages.

[Fresheyeball]

If the /= ligature is to stay the same because its ambiguous, I'd argue that != should NOT be a not-equals sign, as it may have another meaning. I further would argue that the not-equals ligature is the only ligature in fira that has the problem as the result has a semantic meaning. (maybe >= and =< ligatures as well).

But hey, most of us just want things to be pretty and semantic. Is there no way to make this configurable that F# writers can have <> as inequality? For all glyphs determined to have a semantic meaning?

[weavejester]

I'd argue that != should NOT be a not-equals sign, as it may have another meaning.

If it does, no-one has yet raised an issue about it.

Having a FiraCode with different versions for different languages would of course be ideal, but that also sounds like a lot of work!

[Fresheyeball]

Is it really? Is it hard to make alternative builds? The glyphs already exist. Can't this be done with just config (some manifest from glyphs to utf8 or something)?

[weavejester]

It might be easier than I think. Maybe try your hand at it and open a PR?

[Fresheyeball]

Fair enough, if I can do the work. Would you mind pointing me in the right direction? How is fira built? What tooks will I need?

[tomByrer]

? gen_calt.clj

[tonsky]

Fira is built with Glyphs 2 app. I’m working on stylistic sets for next
version, so this problem will be sovled by proper configuration in
style.css of your editor

On Fri, Feb 19, 2016 at 11:44 AM Tom Byrer [email protected] wrote:

? gen_calt.clj
https://github.com/tonsky/FiraCode/blob/master/gen_calt.clj

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub
#125 (comment).

[Fresheyeball]

Well shut my mouth can call me a series of mildly derogatory names. Thats great news! I'm going to close this issue, since the desired behavior is already on the roadmap!

[Fresheyeball]

Any progress on this?