IMO ligatures makes it easier to recognize common symbols used in programming languages and also doesn't affect readability much. Maybe I am younger, but I don't see the problem here.
I don't like it because it tends to combine two distinct characters into one (visually). A great example is '<=' being transformed into '≤' (Pragmata Pro[1] does this) I expect to see two characters, but instead I see one and expect to see a syntax error.
Also it's incredibly annoying when a language uses `<=` for something that's not a comparison.
Julia was right in allowing developers use unicode for variables and operators, so if you want ≤ you simply use that directly (or type \leq in your editor).
It's not about age. I'm rather oldschool, and I like programming ligatures very much. When => intended to imitate thick arrow, seeing thick arrow instead is reasonable, I think
True, but <> in Perl is called the diamond while, in other languages it means “not equal”. If we take ligatures seriously, we’d need them to be language-aware to select the appropriate concept. And for a font to have to be aware of all languages that can express ideas with it is a violent violation of the separation of concerns principle.
If languages opt to make “≠” equivalent to “!=“, match all styles of open/close quotes, and enable me to attribute a value to a variable using an arrow, that’s great.
In the meantime, I’m not sure they are a net positive in all cases and fear they may drive unfortunate syntax choices for people who design languages.
