Thoughts on alphabetical order for punctuation

David MacKay

Punctuation ideas.

I would like to suggest a minimal alphabet, a medium alphabet, and
 a full alphabet.
 The default would be the medium one.

(1)

MINIMAL = lower case only, and a tiny number of punc chars.
No numbers. Good for writing conversation, email. Similar to dasher 168.

   Space character always at end of list (displayed by underscore, by default,
   but the character used to show the space should be adjustable by the
   user, eventually).

(I won't show the space char in the any of the following)

	a..z'-?!,.

 
(2) a MEDIUM punctuation list.

	Let's build it up. Upper case included in the default. 

   a..zA..Z0123456789$'-?!,.

   or
   
   1234567890$'-?!,.

   probably the latter is more standard, cf keyboard. (zero location)

 - provide this punctuation set as standard in all languages.
 Other punctuation to be optional.....? Or maybe....

 (1a) Borderline punctuation chars that
      could have a strong case for being in the minimal standard list:

      /:@

      I'll leave this decision up to you. I think I would tend towards
      including them.

      Where to include these if you do include them:
      I don't have a strong opinion, but suggest this,
      which preserves a distinction between "ordinary writing" ( $'-:?!,. )
      and funny characters.

                 VV   V  
       1234567890/@$'-:?!,.

       However an argument for this order:

       1234567890/$@'-:?!,.

       is that $ is associated with numbers more than is @.
              
	Another borderline character is the NEWLINE character, represented by P
	here. I would put it here

	(since it is a lot like white space)

       1234567890/$@'-:?!,.P
	
 Note the grouping of all characters with status similar to full stop adjacent to
 the space char. - The chars "/$@" are not similar to full stop. The others are.

 The character "'" is not always like a full stop but you do tend
 to find it at the end of words.

	The characters ( and ) should perhaps be included in the
	minimal alphabet too.

	Where to put them?

	Either straight after a..zA..Z

       ()1234567890/$@'-:?!,.P

	or else adjacent to the quote mark, since it is a similar delimiter:

       1234567890/$@()'-:?!,.P

       Another candidate for the minimal alphabet is the POUND sign, 
       or #, to be located next to the $. I will write it as # from now on.

       In conclusion this is the largest "medium" list I would go for.

              1234567890/#$@()'-:?!,.P


(2) Here is a suggestion for the whole punctuation list

What have we left out?

	stop-like characters:              ;

	quote-like:                        "`

	paren-like:                        []{}<>    (in your choice of order)

	strange characters, like @   |\~^_&          (in any order)

	characters associated with numbers, like / and $:
						%*+=      (in any order)

	any others?                        YEN, Euro.


	I would put these in the medium list along with their cousins.

	So it looks like this:

              1234567890%*+=/#$|\~^_&@[]{}<>()"`'-:;?!,.P

	      That's my best stab, feel free to modify it.