A long-lived project that still receives updates
[Unicode 16.0.0] Compares two strings if they are visually confusable as described in Unicode® Technical Standard #39: Both strings get transformed into a skeleton format before comparing them. The skeleton is generated by normalizing the string, replacing confusable characters, and then normalizing the string again.
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
 Dependencies
 Project Readme

Unicode::Confusable [version] [ci]

Compares two strings if they are visually confusable as described in Unicode® Technical Standard #39: Both strings get transformed into a skeleton format before comparing them. The skeleton is generated by normalizing the string (NFD), removing ignorable characters, replacing confusable characters, and normalizing the string again.

Unicode version: 16.0.0 (September 2024)

* The Unicode normalization depends on your Ruby version

Please note: The TR39 standard now includes detection of confusables based on bidi formatting (i.e. right-to-left text). This is currently not supported by this gen.

Supported Rubies: 3.x (might stil work: 2.x)

Usage

Confusable?

require "unicode/confusable"

Unicode::Confusable.confusable? "a", "b" # => false
Unicode::Confusable.confusable? "C", "С" # => true
Unicode::Confusable.confusable? "ℜ𝘂ᖯʏ", "Ruby" # => true
Unicode::Confusable.confusable? "Michael", "Michae1" # => true
Unicode::Confusable.confusable? "⁇", "?" # => false
Unicode::Confusable.confusable? "⁇", "??" # => true

Skeleton

Unicode::Confusable.skeleton "ℜ𝘂ᖯʏ" # => "Ruby"

Please note: The skeleton is an intermediate representation, not meant for any other use than testing confusability, according to the standard.

List

List all characters that map to the confusable exemplar given:

Unicode::Confusable.list("o", false)
# => ["ం", "ಂ", "ം", "ං", "०", "੦", "૦", "௦", "౦", "೦", "൦", "๐", "໐", "၀", "٥", "۵", "o", "ℴ", "𝐨", "𝑜", "𝒐", "𝓸", "𝔬", "𝕠", "𝖔", "𝗈", "𝗼", "𝘰", "𝙤", "𝚘", "ᴏ", "ᴑ", "ꬽ", "ο", "𝛐", "𝜊", "𝝄", "𝝾", "𝞸", "σ", "𝛔", "𝜎", "𝝈", "𝞂", "𝞼", "ⲟ", "о", "ჿ", "օ", "ס", "ه", "𞸤", "𞹤", "𞺄", "ﻫ", "ﻬ", "ﻪ", "ﻩ", "ھ", "ﮬ", "ﮭ", "ﮫ", "ﮪ", "ہ", "ﮨ", "ﮩ", "ﮧ", "ﮦ", "ە", "ഠ", "ဝ", "𐓪", "𑣈", "𑣗", "𐐬"]

If you omit the second parameter, it will also show confusables, where the given character is just a part of:

Unicode::Confusable.list("o")
# => ["⒪", "ꜵ", "℅", "ᴔ", "ꭁ", "ꭂ", "ﷲ", "№", "ం", "ಂ", "ം", "ං", "०", "੦", "૦", "௦", "౦", "೦", "൦", "๐", "໐", "၀", "٥", "۵", "o", "ℴ", "𝐨", "𝑜", "𝒐", "𝓸", "𝔬", "𝕠", "𝖔", "𝗈", "𝗼", "𝘰", "𝙤", "𝚘", "ᴏ", "ᴑ", "ꬽ", "ο", "𝛐", "𝜊", "𝝄", "𝝾", "𝞸", "σ", "𝛔", "𝜎", "𝝈", "𝞂", "𝞼", "ⲟ", "о", "ჿ", "օ", "ס", "ه", "𞸤", "𞹤", "𞺄", "ﻫ", "ﻬ", "ﻪ", "ﻩ", "ھ", "ﮬ", "ﮭ", "ﮫ", "ﮪ", "ہ", "ﮨ", "ﮩ", "ﮧ", "ﮦ", "ە", "ഠ", "ဝ", "𐓪", "𑣈", "𑣗", "𐐬", "ۿ", "ø", "ꬾ", "ɵ", "ꝋ", "ө", "ѳ", "ꮎ", "ꮻ", "ꭴ", "ﳙ", "ơ", "œ", "ɶ", "∞", "ꝏ", "ꚙ", "ﳗ", "ﱑ", "ﳘ", "ﱒ", "ﶓ", "ﶔ", "ﱓ", "ﱔ", "ൟ", "တ", "ꭣ", "ﲠ", "ﳢ", "ﲥ", "ﳤ", "ﷻ", "ﴱ", "ﳨ", "ﴲ", "ﳪ", "ﷺ", "ﷷ", "ﳍ", "ﳖ", "ﳯ", "ﳞ", "ﳱ", "ﳦ", "ﲛ", "ﳠ", "ﯭ", "ﯬ"]

No Bidi-Confusable Check

Testing for bidirectional confusables is currently not supported.

Single-script / Mixed-script / Whole-script

TR 39 also describes mechanisms for further categorization of confusables. This is currently not part of this gem, however the unicode-scripts gem does include mixed-script detection, which you can use for this purpose.

See unicode-x for more Unicode related micro libraries.

MIT License