Are We Legacy Computing Yet?

6 hours ago

Unicode blocks U+1FB00-U+1FBFF (Symbols for Legacy Computing) and U+1CC00-U+1CEBF (supplement) contain graphical characters from 70s-90s computers used for semi-graphical elements like games and terminal UIs.
Terminal emulators often implement custom drawing for these characters due to limited font support, allowing proper alignment and user customization.
Support testing involved configuring terminals with fonts lacking these glyphs and printing characters; any displayed characters indicate custom emulator logic.
Ghostty shows high support (85%-99% for main block, 53%-99% for supplement), while Kitty has moderate support (74%-84% main, 33%-63% supplement).
URXVT has no support (0%), VTE shows strong support (86%-94% main, 42%-79% supplement), and XtermJS has mixed support (92%-100% main, 0% supplement).
The article categorizes symbols into 'Important' (e.g., block mosaics, smooth mosaics) and 'Unimportant' (e.g., game sprites, schematic symbols) for terminal support analysis.

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