Guides & explainers on glyphs, emoji and open fonts
Plain-language, primary-sourced articles on how Unicode really works, how to make your own kaomoji and ASCII art, and how open-font licensing works. Reviewed before publishing.
What 1,892 Font Files Say About Their Licence — 2026 Audit
The licence explainer covers what the SIL OFL permits. This is the other half: we opened every font file on one ordinary…
Heart kaomoji to copy and paste
Almost every face above carries a heart — 90 of the 92, with the two exceptions named further down — and you…
Cute kaomoji to copy and paste
Every face above is a cute kaomoji you can copy with one tap and paste anywhere that accepts text. They are sorted…
How to propose a new emoji to Unicode
Anyone can submit an emoji proposal — but very few are accepted. Here is how the process actually works, who reviews it,…
Make your own kaomoji & ASCII art
Combine code points into expressive faces that render everywhere — no tofu, no broken boxes.
Font licensing: SIL OFL & Creative Commons
What you can and can’t do with open fonts, in plain language — bundling, modifying and selling.
Every heart symbol & how it renders
Heart glyphs across Unicode blocks, their code points, and platform-by-platform rendering notes.
The crying emoji, explained
Loudly-crying vs slightly-frowning-with-tear: meanings, origins and how each platform draws them.
Egyptian hieroglyphs in Unicode
How an ancient writing system became code points — and how to type them correctly today.
Turn a picture into ASCII art
How picture-to-ASCII converters work, choosing a character ramp, and keeping output readable.
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