Talk:Dingbat

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Text and/or other creative content from this version of List of Unicode characters was copied or moved into Dingbat with this edit on 22:55, 3 February 2015. The former page's history now serves to provide attribution for that content in the latter page, and it must not be deleted as long as the latter page exists.

Old comments[edit]

"ding"ing? "bat"ing? Can't figure out that sounds. Thanks, --Abdull 09:54, 24 July 2005 (UTC)[reply]

also it would be nice if we could see the dingbats, perhaps replace them or add a picture of them, all i see is ?

Didn't Archie Bunker call Edith dingbat in the TV series "All in the Family"? Notfound 00:04, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed. For some reason, someone decided to move such information to the Dingbat disambiguation page. -- Infrogmation 02:44, 23 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Why see also simlish? How is that relevant? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 149.169.107.30 (talk) 01:05, 6 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Non-typographic[edit]

THIS DEFINITION IS TOTALLY WRONG!!!!

'Dingbat' is an Australian word meaning a person of low intelligence eg an idiot, a bonehead, etc. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.48.59.60 (talk) 05:14, 4 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

NO, IT ISN'T!!!!

The word originated in the 1830s and was a generic term for an object or device that didn't have a specific name or whose name wasn't known (much like "doohickey", thingumajig", "dingus", etc.). It was later used to mean a foolish person since around 1905, probably because the sound of the word seemed appropriate, like "dipstick" or "nimrod". Captain Quirk (talk) 21:46, 15 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

See comment of "14:01, 31 October 2016" below... AnonMoos (talk) 04:09, 22 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

"Invented by Eddie Dolon"[edit]

This part of the text is not a complete sentence. What was invented by Eddie Dolon?! Wegesrand (talk) 16:33, 15 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Picture[edit]

I don't get the point of the picture. It shows a poem printed on a highly decorated page, but the decorations have nothing to do with dingbats, surely? They are typical late-19th-century book decoration. Unless the claim is that all decoration is dingbat, which would require completely different definitions, I think this picture does not belong here. --Doric Loon (talk) 14:02, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The decorations have everything to do with dingbats, surely. There are examples of dingbats. Read the article for an explanation. Hope this helps! -- Infrogmation (talk) 00:19, 13 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

No, these are not dingbats. The article also confuses printer's flowers (ornamental) with bullets, arrows, and other "special sorts" (a "sort" is an old name for a piece of type, probably because they had to be sorted into individual compartments in the type case, or tray, after use). The decorative cuts, or engravings, on the poem piece would have been on wooden blocks (likely faced with cooper or steel to hold the actual engraving) and not pieces of type. Dingbats are pieces of type. But I'm not sure where the usage came from, and maybe in some parts of the world "dingbat" was indeed used for any sort of decoration; I don't know. Terminology in the "desktop publishing" world was looser, too, because so many new people started using type. Barefootliam (talk) 09:40, 5 March 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hedera[edit]

Ivy has a note at the top that says:

"Hedera" redirects here. For the use of the term in typography, see Dingbat.

But the term "Hedera" is not explained in this article. -- Beland (talk) 23:00, 14 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Seems more like a fleuron than a dingbat anyway... AnonMoos (talk) 01:01, 15 February 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Cross[edit]

The Christian cross should not be confused with the Dagger (typography). Strangely so, in the article's plate the dagger is missing, its place taken up by three or four crosses. Is there an expert here to amend this? --Chrysalifourfour (talk) 18:07, 18 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Not sure what you mean by "plate". Anyway, ✝ ✞ ✟ are included in the official Unicode Zapf Dingbat character block, while "†" is in another character block... AnonMoos (talk) 20:00, 18 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

By 'plate' I mean the 'table' where dingbats are presented in the article. Not sure what the correct term is anyway! So, where is the dagger? Is it not part of the Unicode dingbat block? Or is it part of some other character family, in which case why would it be encoded U+2020? Maybe I'm totally wrong here, I just thought that the dagger and the double dagger are standard symbols in most major font families. --Chrysalifourfour (talk) 13:07, 19 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The crosses are in the Unicode Dingbats block; see official documentation at http://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U2700.pdf . The dagger is in the Unicode General Punctuation block (see documentation at http://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U2000.pdf ) and has traditionally been considered more of a typographic accessory than a purely ornamental or symbolic dingbat. AnonMoos (talk) 21:44, 19 November 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Symbols not displayed[edit]

Many symbols in the tables in this article are not correctly displayed in my browser (Firefox on Vista). As I expect this must be the case for very many users, please would someone knowledgeable add info to the article telling us all how to add the necessary fonts to our computers ? Many thanks ! Darkman101 (talk) 15:00, 30 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Same thing for me, but as your message had no reply, I guess they don't care. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A01:E35:8A8D:FE80:9F7:ED1:3427:35BE (talk) 23:45, 24 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

It's dependent on which fonts you have installed on your computer -- and also, some older software and browser versions won't display Unicode characters outside the basic multilingual plane (BMP) no matter what fonts you have installed... AnonMoos (talk) 08:01, 1 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Origin of the Term[edit]

It would be a good idea to include a section on the origin of the word "dingbats" as the name for printer's ornaments. It might require some research in older paper books as I cannot find anything definitive in my google searches. Cshay (talk) 23:45, 30 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

From OED 1933 supplement, it seems to have originated as an indefinite word like doohickey or thingumabob, and its first prominent use in the 19th century was to refer to Fractional currency (United States)... AnonMoos (talk) 14:01, 31 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Ornemental Dingbats shows nothing[edit]

Could you add a warning message explaining how to display them? -- 2a01:e35:8a8d:fe80:9f7:ed1:3427:35be 23:44, 24 November 2016

It's dependent on which fonts you have installed on your computer -- and also, some older software and browser versions won't display Unicode characters outside the basic multilingual plane (BMP) no matter what fonts you have installed... AnonMoos (talk) 08:01, 1 December 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Typographic ornament =/= Dingbat[edit]

I disagree with the fact that the page for "typographic ornament" redirects directly to the page for "dingbat". "Dingbat" is a term used in American slang and only used in the field of typography since the 1930s, while typographic ornaments have a richer and longer history, and are not limited to tiny symbols with the same size as other characters (think of the metal-cast fleurons, wreaths and frames that used to adorn the pages of old books). Also, see the Commons page Typographic ornaments to see a great number of specimens that escape the narrow frame of the dingbats of today. I intend to write a history section about typographic ornaments (including the dingbats of digital fonts), but I don't think it would be appropriate to include it in a page called "Dingbat". I will probably create a page for "Typographic ornament", which would include a link to the detailed "Dingbat" page. On the confusion around the term "dingbat" (and what constitues a dingbat and what doesn't), there's this document (Els dingbats : orígens històrics i evolució) which explores the question further.Teknad (talk) 16:14, 12 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

If it's not a "character" in any meaningful or useful sense, then it probably doesn't belong on the Dingbat article... AnonMoos (talk) 13:19, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

In that case, the page for "Typographic ornament" could be created. See for instance, the article about the topic on the French Wikipedia (fr::Ornement (typographie)), which includes many elements, like strokes, that can't not be considered as characters. Best regards, -Teknad (talk) 11:47, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

In US journalim, 'dingbat' as a typographical ornament can refer to the little headshot of a columnist to mark their column. From Dayton Daily News 19 March 1987 page 5 (link is behind firewall but it's here language is: 'In newspaper talk, this small photo and the type accompanying a column log is known as a dingbat. That's dingbat as in "typographical Ornament"'valereee (talk) 13:15, 12 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Unicode block description into separate page[edit]

I have split the extensive Unicode block description into Dingbats (Unicode block). Some remaining content may be duplicated. See also the talk there. -DePiep (talk) 19:32, 2 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]