While it's definitely cute and amusing, this is exactly why languages that specify their source code in non-ascii encodings are a bad idea. Fully 92.6% of working programmers have no idea how to produce a λ or γ on their input device of choice. Maybe a third of those could eventually find it with a character picker tool.

Java started this (in the unicode era anyway -- yeah yeah, APL). The community quite sanely rejected it as a matter of style. I have no idea why it hasn't been killed dead in new designs.

Maybe it’s time for a plugin that does this (or maybe it already exists?):

You press the backslash key, enter the name of the symbol, then press enter, and the symbol will show up in your buffer.

Something like:

\lambda -> λ

\Lambda -> Λ

\\ -> \

et cetra.

frosted-flakes

A dedicated global compose key solves this problem very elegantly. Hitting the ◆ compose key (right alt for me) followed by a series of intuitive characters inserts the corresponding character.

For example:

◆ - - - produces an em dash (—)

◆ - - . produces an en dash (–)

◆ ' e produces é

◆ | c produces the cent symbol (¢)

Usually, you can just guess the combination and be right 3/4 times. Otherwise, it's fairly easy to look it up, or create it if it doesn't exist yet.

Some distros of Linux have this built-in, but I use WinCompose[1] on Windows.

[1]https://github.com/samhocevar/wincompose