# Jupyter Unicode symbols issue
**URL:** https://discourse.julialang.org/t/jupyter-unicode-symbols-issue/94407
**Category:** Jupyter-Notebook
**Tags:** question
**Created:** [February 10, 2023, 1:31pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/jupyter-unicode-symbols-issue/94407 "2023-02-10T13:31:00Z")
**Posts on this page:** 9
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Nikolay\_Ebel](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Nikolay_Ebel)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2023, 1:31pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/jupyter-unicode-symbols-issue/94407/1 "2023-02-10T13:31:00Z")
Hi!
I have a problem with using the Unicode symbols in Jupyter lab. After entering \bbD, \bbO, or any other character with the Unicode starting with “1D” in a Jupyter cell, Jupyter stops to understand any other Unicode characters in this cell. For example, I can enter “α β γ δ 𝐀”, but after this, if I try to enter “α β γ δ 𝐀 \alpha” and press Tab, it throws “BoundsError: attempt to access 23-codeunit String at index [1:24]”, see the picture below.
What can I do with it? The same problem appears for Julia 1.8.3 and Julia 1.8.5. It appears only in the browser version of Jupyter, there are no problems in vs code, but I prefer to work in the browser because it eats less memory in this way and this is critical for me.
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### Author:  [@stevengj](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/stevengj)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2023, 1:38pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/jupyter-unicode-symbols-issue/94407/2 "2023-02-10T13:38:13Z")
> [@Nikolay\_Ebel](#):
>
> I have a problem with using the Unicode symbols in Jupyter lab. After entering \bbD, \bbO, or any other character with the Unicode starting with “1D” in a Jupyter cell, Jupyter stops to understand any other Unicode characters in this cell.
It works for me in Jupyter. What version of Jupyter are you using?
This sounds an awful lot like a bug that was fixed 5 years ago (because Jupyter was mixing up UTF-16 code units with characters … [UTF-16 sucks](http://utf8everywhere.org/)): [Broken tab completion after high Unicode codepoints · Issue #541 · JuliaLang/IJulia.jl · GitHub](https://github.com/JuliaLang/IJulia.jl/issues/541) … I hope they haven’t regressed?
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### Author:  [@Nikolay\_Ebel](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Nikolay_Ebel)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2023, 1:39pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/jupyter-unicode-symbols-issue/94407/3 "2023-02-10T13:39:52Z")
I have version 3.5.2.
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### Author:  [@stevengj](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/stevengj)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2023, 1:42pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/jupyter-unicode-symbols-issue/94407/4 "2023-02-10T13:42:32Z")
> [@Nikolay\_Ebel](#):
>
> I have version 3.5.2.
This is an ancient version (the current release is 6.5.x). Upgrade, and the problem should go away.
_Update_: Oh, I see that you are referring to JupyterLab, not Jupyter. My mistake. Maybe they forgot to fix the problem in JupyterLab?
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### Author:  [@Nikolay\_Ebel](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Nikolay_Ebel)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2023, 1:54pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/jupyter-unicode-symbols-issue/94407/5 "2023-02-10T13:54:01Z")
It works in Jupyter-notebook 6.5.2, but not in Jupyter-lab 3.6.1 (which seems to be the latest). It is irritating, but the notebook suits me well too, thank you very much!
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### Author:  [@pdeffebach](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/pdeffebach)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2023, 2:06pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/jupyter-unicode-symbols-issue/94407/6 "2023-02-10T14:06:47Z")
Can you not update Jupyter-lab?
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### Author:  [@Nikolay\_Ebel](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Nikolay_Ebel)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2023, 2:08pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/jupyter-unicode-symbols-issue/94407/7 "2023-02-10T14:08:58Z")
I have already updated it, if you wish, I can try to downgrade it to another version, which one?
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### Author:  [@stevengj](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/stevengj)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2023, 2:40pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/jupyter-unicode-symbols-issue/94407/8 "2023-02-10T14:40:54Z")
> [@Nikolay\_Ebel](#):
>
> It works in Jupyter-notebook 6.5.2, but not in Jupyter-lab 3.6.1 (which seems to be the latest).
~~Please file an [issue with jupyterlab](https://github.com/jupyterlab/jupyterlab/issues)~~, and reference the corresponding issue [jupyter/jupyter\_client#259](https://github.com/jupyter/jupyter_client/issues/259) that was fixed with Jupyter. I’ve filed [incorrect cursor\_pos for completion requests with non-BMP Unicode characters · Issue #13961 · jupyterlab/jupyterlab · GitHub](https://github.com/jupyterlab/jupyterlab/issues/13961)
~~Actually, hang on, it might be IJulia’s fault if it is mis-identifying the protocol version [here](https://github.com/JuliaLang/IJulia.jl/blob/537ee797026b8598e7a3a96e63afc4a2aaa3d27b/src/handlers.jl#L44-L48). Let me check it.~~ Nope, it definitely looks like the same old bug in JupyterLab — if I force IJulia to use the old buggy UTF-16 protocol by changing `VersionNumber(m.header["version"]) ≥ v"5.2"` to `false`, then it works in JupyterLab (but not in Jupyter).
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### Author:  [@Nikolay\_Ebel](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/Nikolay_Ebel)
#### Post date: [February 10, 2023, 3:20pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/jupyter-unicode-symbols-issue/94407/9 "2023-02-10T15:20:13Z")
Thanks!