Re: Unprotecting "I"
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg64818] Re: Unprotecting "I"
- From: "Steve Luttrell" <steve_usenet at _removemefirst_luttrell.org.uk>
- Date: Sat, 4 Mar 2006 02:35:37 -0500 (EST)
- References: <du83rr$t12$1@smc.vnet.net>
- Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com
There isn't a problem with the lowercase letters, because none of them are reserved. For uppercase letters there is a neat workaround if you are prepared to use a different (but related) alphabet (e.g. Script). If you open up the Complete Characters palette (i.e. File, Palettes, Complete Characters) and then open the Letters, Script subset of buttons you will see the Script alphabet. If you hover the mouse over a button then you can see the short-cut in the bottom left hand of the palette. So "esc s c I esc" (omit inverted commas) will give you a script I that is independent of the plain I that is reserved. Steve Luttrell "Chris Young" <c1572young at earthlink.net> wrote in message news:du83rr$t12$1 at smc.vnet.net... > I'd like to be able to occasionally use all the letters of the alphabet > (or at least the first 12 or so), both small and capital letters, for > variables. I think it's the easiest way to present a lot of formulas. I > was able to Unprotect everything except "I", which Mathematica reserves > for the "imaginary unity", "i". Is there any way to temporarily > unprotect "I"? > > (Also, I wish there was some way to copy the example from my notebook > without all the extraneous back-slashes, etc.) > > What I get from Mathematica is as follows: > > Unprotect[I] > Protect::locked: "Symbol \[ImaginaryI] is locked. > > Attributes[I] > {Locked, Protected, ReadProtected} > > ClearAttributes[I, Locked] > Attributes::locked: Symbol \[ImaginaryI] is locked. > > Clear[I] > Clear::wrsym: Symbol \[ImaginaryI] is Protected. > > ClearAll[I] > ClearAll::"wrsym": "Symbol \[ImaginaryI] is Protected." > > Any help appreciated. > > -- Chris Young > c56young at earthlink.net >