xcompose VS math-hydras

most emoji are banned, as are nonstandard space symbols like thin space and some other things. emoticons (things like :-) and XD) are allowed. generally alphabetic characters and digits are allowed, and some other things, but i think unknown unicode is forbidden by default. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23440551 has some investigation and results which are probably still accurate

i do most of my algebraic formulas with the compose key and a custom compose map mostly written by mark shoulson https://github.com/kragen/xcompose

for the above i pasted part of the old permic table from wikipedia

    >>> s = '''𐍐‎    𐍑‎       𐍒‎       𐍓‎       𐍔‎       𐍕‎       𐍖‎       𐍗‎       𐍘‎       𐍙‎       𐍚‎       𐍛‎       𐍜‎       𐍝‎       𐍞‎       𐍟‎

Also, since the default Compose file doesn't quite satisfy, see https://github.com/kragen/xcompose; they have defined a bunch of key sequences, which I use (with some extensions of my own — for example, I wanted a quick way to type a̋, and this wasn't built into the default sequences, since it uses a combining character).

Well, I wasn't aware of this shortcut — that being said, it doesn't matter, because I'm on Linux and use the Compose key anyway (essentially, I type Left Alt and then a key sequence); and I've installed the extensions found at https://github.com/kragen/xcompose, which supplies many more combinations which the default XCompose doesn't contain.

Another possible solution is to define a compose key (I use SysRq) to type characters not on the keyboard, such that (for example) the three-key sequence "SysRq . Z" is Ż.

Here's the XCompose file I use:

https://github.com/kragen/xcompose

the way, the truth, and the light

For linux users there is the compose key which also allows for custom sequences.

Use .XCompose and enable ralt-dot-dot and a million (okay, not a million. 1066 in mine) unicode characters everywhere.

Or if you want some truly "global" keybindings, and much broader than just math symbols…

Have you ever heard of compose? That's also very helpful. If you use linux, take a look at https://wiki.portal.chalmers.se/agda/pmwiki.php?n=Main.XCompose and https://github.com/kragen/xcompose .