[foz]

As a developer, I have spent years writing and learning to parse the meaning of sequences like ==, ===, <=, ~=, and so on. For nearly all of us, the ligatures in this font are completely new. I think it's a creative and interesting idea, but it means re-training my brain to recognize them, which would take time.

And even if I could get my preferred editors to work with it, I would see the traditional symbols when reading code on the web, or pairing with another developer who does not use the font. It seems like a barrier to understanding, something that by nature developers strive to eliminate.

I'm torn. This idea could be something that changes how we all express code symbolically, or it will just become a fad that a tiny percentage of developers will insist on using, to the frustration of everyone else.

[evolve2k]

> ..developers will insist on using, to the frustration of everyone else.

I'm thinking It won't change the underlying text so I imagine it will only apply to the individual developer choosing to apply these ligatures on their display, as such should have little effect on other devs. Unless you mean to say people might start to use this in documentation and code examples, in which case this is indeed an interesting thing to consider.

[tonsky]

Let’s be realistic. You don’t have learn or retrain your brain to understand Fira Code. Symbols are all the same, they just look better.

[lttlrck]

The difference between e.g. -> and --> is a length of a small solid line. To me that's equates to a huge drop in readability, countering the easy to brain-parse argument.

[tonsky]

Agree, but no language uses both -> and -->

[Terretta]

Nope. Fira gets semiotics subtly wrong.

For instance, the HTML comment bookends. In Fira, they are long arrows. In plain ASCII they are enclosing brackets connecting to comment.