Keep every classic ASCII byte sacred.
Then ascend scripts, agents, media refs, quantum-safe control, and deep-space links into one stream - fixed-width control for machines, variable-width data for humans, never remapping 0x00-0x7F.
ASCENT is not “Unicode but better.” It is a wire contract greppers can still trust.
The standard in one frame.
Parse law, planes, Hello Universe stream anatomy, profiles, and control sketches. Open full size for reading or sharing.
Type anything. Watch the sacred range hold.
Pure classic ASCII is valid ASCENT-7 with no header. The moment you leave 0-127, you enter extension planes - but those first seven bits never change meaning.
Hello, Universe - decoded live
Paste text on the left to encode into ASCENT hex, or edit hex on the right and Decode. Results update the byte map, hex dump, and decoded units below. Sample Hello, Universe loads on first visit.
Paste text, then Encode. Pure ASCII is ASCENT-7 (byte-identical). Non-ASCII uses frozen Cont 0xA0-0xBF ASCENT-V, bridge INLINE, or reject.
Waiting for decode.
Eleven planes. One eternal law.
Control is fixed or length-declared. Data is variable-width. Private planes cannot redefine P0-P2.
Control tokens travel with the prose.
0x9A AGENT_OPEN 0xC1 ver opcode flags len args 0x9B AGENT_CLOSE opcodes: STOP ROLE TOOL THINK HANDOFF CAP SAFETY
LLMs and tools already invent ad-hoc markers. ASCENT makes them first-class wire citizens: fenced, length-declared, skippable when unknown, and impossible to confuse with sacred P0 text. THINK stays opaque on shared logs. SAFETY marks untrusted tool results as data, never silent control.
When the bit error rate stops being theoretical.
sync D5 E5 C0 DE profile · ecc params · len · unit · parity default ECC: RS(255,223) GF(256), interleave 8 parity fail = erase unit (no mojibake best-effort, ever)
Mid-cruise probes may freeze the quantum-safe algorithm set. Earth registries can grow. Frozen missions stay boring on purpose.
Ship-ready draft, open MIT.
| SPEC.md | Full A-F normative draft |
| ABSTRACT.md | One-page RFC-style face |
| ascent_decode.py | Python reference decoder |
| hello-universe.ascent.bin | 132-byte civilization kit |
| Letter | Meaning |
|---|---|
| A | ASCII / American roots |
| S | Successor / Standard |
| C | Compatible / Code |
| E | Encoding of |
| N | Named registries |
| T | Text first-class |