Idea: mode where emojis get an emoji element

[Simon-Laux]

Some older platforms (older android and older ubuntu touch, possibly also kaiOS) have problems with unicode emoji rendering even when updating the emoji fonts.

To solve that we should add a mode (not do it by default) where the emojis are parsed into their own element, so the platforms can display via a custom function that renders the emoji from a sprite map for example.

The emoji elements should include the whole grapheme cluster (“user-perceived character”) in a single emoji element:

• so both regional indicators that represent a country flag
• face emojis with skin color
• combined emojis such as family
• gendered emojis
• and other emojis that consist of multiple unicode characters

#56 already adds correct emoji parsing of those clusters, so we should take it's code as base for this.

@lk108 might need this for proper emoji support on ubuntu touch

[lk108]

sounds great

[deepspaceaxolotl]

Great idea. I wonder if there's a possibility of extending this in a sense to define one's own emoji sprite map? For example, I much prefer Twemoji over my OS's emoji font, but it's not always possible to change it. I also prefer an older version of Twemoji for some specific emoji, so being able to simply define an image to use in one's client would be excellent. (This may not be the best place for this idea, but it feels related and I'm not sure where else to put it, so hope this isn't an issue.)

[Simon-Laux]

it would allow clients to implement alternative ways of rendering emojis, like the sprite sheet method you mentioned. though rendering composite emojis (like the different family variations or emojis with skin color, hair color and gender) could bring the sprite sheet method to it's limits.

But that would be anyway up to the app, the message-parser would just correctly separate the emojis, so the family emoji appears as one element instead of multiple characters.

PS: I used the word "composite" but the real technical term is "unicode grapheme cluster"

[deepspaceaxolotl]

It might be worth looking into how other platforms like Discord do those, since I know they use spritesheets (have managed to extract them for personal usage, myself).