Article
11/17/2011

UnicodeCategory Enumeration

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Defines the Unicode category of a character.

Namespace: System.Globalization
Assembly: mscorlib (in mscorlib.dll)

Syntax

'Declaration
<ComVisibleAttribute(True)> _
Public Enumeration UnicodeCategory

[ComVisibleAttribute(true)]
public enum UnicodeCategory

Members

	Member name	Description
	UppercaseLetter	Indicates that the character is an uppercase letter. Signified by the Unicode designation "Lu" (letter, uppercase).
	LowercaseLetter	Indicates that the character is a lowercase letter. Signified by the Unicode designation "Ll" (letter, lowercase).
	TitlecaseLetter	Indicates that the character is a titlecase letter. Signified by the Unicode designation "Lt" (letter, titlecase).
	ModifierLetter	Indicates that the character is a modifier letter, which is free-standing spacing character that indicates modifications of a preceding letter. Signified by the Unicode designation "Lm" (letter, modifier).
	OtherLetter	Indicates that the character is a letter that is not an uppercase letter, a lowercase letter, a titlecase letter, or a modifier letter. Signified by the Unicode designation "Lo" (letter, other).
	NonSpacingMark	Indicates that the character is a nonspacing character, which indicates modifications of a base character. Signified by the Unicode designation "Mn" (mark, nonspacing).
	SpacingCombiningMark	Indicates that the character is a spacing character, which indicates modifications of a base character and affects the width of the glyph for that base character. Signified by the Unicode designation "Mc" (mark, spacing combining).
	EnclosingMark	Indicates that the character is an enclosing mark, which is a nonspacing combining character that surrounds all previous characters up to and including a base character. Signified by the Unicode designation "Me" (mark, enclosing).
	DecimalDigitNumber	Indicates that the character is a decimal digit, that is, in the range 0 through 9. Signified by the Unicode designation "Nd" (number, decimal digit).
	LetterNumber	Indicates that the character is a number represented by a letter, instead of a decimal digit, for example, the Roman numeral for five, which is "V". The indicator is signified by the Unicode designation "Nl" (number, letter).
	OtherNumber	Indicates that the character is a number that is neither a decimal digit nor a letter number, for example, the fraction 1/2. The indicator is signified by the Unicode designation "No" (number, other).
	SpaceSeparator	Indicates that the character is a space character, which has no glyph but is not a control or format character. Signified by the Unicode designation "Zs" (separator, space).
	LineSeparator	Indicates that the character is used to separate lines of text. Signified by the Unicode designation "Zl" (separator, line).
	ParagraphSeparator	Indicates that the character is used to separate paragraphs. Signified by the Unicode designation "Zp" (separator, paragraph).
	Control	Indicates that the character is a control code, with a Unicode value of U+007F or in the range U+0000 through U+001F or U+0080 through U+009F. Signified by the Unicode designation "Cc" (other, control).
	Format	Indicates that the character is a format character, which is not normally rendered but affects the layout of text or the operation of text processes. Signified by the Unicode designation "Cf" (other, format).
	Surrogate	Indicates that the character is a high surrogate or a low surrogate. Surrogate code values are in the range U+D800 through U+DFFF. Signified by the Unicode designation "Cs" (other, surrogate).
	PrivateUse	Indicates that the character is a private-use character, with a Unicode value in the range U+E000 through U+F8FF. Signified by the Unicode designation "Co" (other, private use).
	ConnectorPunctuation	Indicates that the character is a connector punctuation, which connects two characters. Signified by the Unicode designation "Pc" (punctuation, connector).
	DashPunctuation	Indicates that the character is a dash or a hyphen. Signified by the Unicode designation "Pd" (punctuation, dash).
	OpenPunctuation	Indicates that the character is the opening character of one of the paired punctuation marks, such as parentheses, square brackets, and braces. Signified by the Unicode designation "Ps" (punctuation, open).
	ClosePunctuation	Indicates that the character is the closing character of one of the paired punctuation marks, such as parentheses, square brackets, and braces. Signified by the Unicode designation "Pe" (punctuation, close).
	InitialQuotePunctuation	Indicates that the character is an opening or initial quotation mark. Signified by the Unicode designation "Pi" (punctuation, initial quote).
	FinalQuotePunctuation	Indicates that the character is a closing or final quotation mark. Signified by the Unicode designation "Pf" (punctuation, final quote).
	OtherPunctuation	Indicates that the character is a punctuation that is not a connector punctuation, a dash punctuation, an open punctuation, a close punctuation, an initial quote punctuation, or a final quote punctuation. Signified by the Unicode designation "Po" (punctuation, other).
	MathSymbol	Indicates that the character is a mathematical symbol, such as "+" or "= ". Signified by the Unicode designation "Sm" (symbol, math).
	CurrencySymbol	Indicates that the character is a currency symbol. Signified by the Unicode designation "Sc" (symbol, currency).
	ModifierSymbol	Indicates that the character is a modifier symbol, which indicates modifications of surrounding characters. For example, the fraction slash indicates that the number to the left is the numerator and the number to the right is the denominator. The indicator is signified by the Unicode designation "Sk" (symbol, modifier).
	OtherSymbol	Indicates that the character is a symbol that is not a mathematical symbol, a currency symbol or a modifier symbol. Signified by the Unicode designation "So" (symbol, other).
	OtherNotAssigned	Indicates that the character is not assigned to any Unicode category. Signified by the Unicode designation "Cn" (other, not assigned).

Remarks

A member of the UnicodeCategory enumeration is returned by the Char.GetUnicodeCategory and CharUnicodeInfo.GetUnicodeCategory methods. The UnicodeCategory enumeration is also used to support Char methods, such as IsUpper(Char). Such methods determine whether a specified character is a member of a particular Unicode general category. A Unicode general category defines the broad classification of a character, that is, designation as a type of letter, decimal digit, separator, mathematical symbol, punctuation, and so on.

This enumeration is based on The Unicode Standard, version 5.0. For more information, see the "UCD File Format" and "General Category Values" subtopics at the Unicode Character Database.

The Unicode Standard defines the following:

A surrogate pair is a coded character representation for a single abstract character that consists of a sequence of two code units, where the first unit of the pair is a high surrogate and the second is a low surrogate. A high surrogate is a Unicode code point in the range U+D800 through U+DBFF and a low surrogate is a Unicode code point in the range U+DC00 through U+DFFF.

A combining character sequence is a combination of a base character and one or more combining characters. A surrogate pair represents a base character or a combining character. A combining character is either spacing or nonspacing. A spacing combining character takes up a spacing position by itself when rendered, while a nonspacing combining character does not. Diacritics are an example of nonspacing combining characters.

A modifier letter is a free-standing spacing character that, like a combining character, indicates modifications of a preceding letter.

An enclosing mark is a nonspacing combining character that surrounds all previous characters up to and including a base character.

A format character is a character that is not normally rendered but that affects the layout of text or the operation of text processes.

The Unicode Standard defines several variations to some punctuation marks. For example, a hyphen can be one of several code values that represent a hyphen, such as U+002D (hyphen-minus) or U+00AD (soft hyphen) or U+2010 (hyphen) or U+2011 (nonbreaking hyphen). The same is true for dashes, space characters, and quotation marks.

The Unicode Standard also assigns codes to representations of decimal digits that are specific to a given script or language, for example, U+0030 (digit zero) and U+0660 (Arabic-Indic digit zero).

Version Information

Silverlight

Supported in: 5, 4, 3

Silverlight for Windows Phone

Supported in: Windows Phone OS 7.1, Windows Phone OS 7.0

XNA Framework

Supported in: Xbox 360, Windows Phone OS 7.0

Platforms

For a list of the operating systems and browsers that are supported by Silverlight, see Supported Operating Systems and Browsers.