I've lately been working with image compression routines which output strings, and I've been able to increase efficiency and versatility by using as wide a range of characters to store data as possible. I've grown a bit frustrated at times, though, because any strings which use Puny font characters don't show up correctly unless I go into Puny Font mode. There have been a number of times I couldn't get things to work, and spent time debugging my code, only to realize that the problem was that I forgot to press Ctrl+P.

I know it's not a big issue, and it can be worked around, but it's kind of inconsistent how strings can be created with Puny characters at any time, but you have to enter a certain mode to view the output correctly. Is it possible this could be changed without breaking some other feature? I mean, is there any way to let the program know that a string has been created by Pico-8 and therefore display it as intended?

Maybe this would get more visibility in the bugs section!
Or maybe @zep will see this.

I went ahead and changed the thread's category, thanks for the suggestion.

I am also suffering from this problem.
I think it would be easier if I could paste a puny font by pressing Ctrl+Shift+V in any mode.

I understand why it doesn't let you so you can paste other text in without problems but I've had horrid headaches for hours wondering why my data is messed up because of it. I wish as a compromise if there was any puny text in the data and you weren't in cmd+p mode it'd flash a warning or notice at the bottom

+1. I've wondered if the extended characters can be detected during the paste action...?

I like @shiftalow's idea, for a ctrl-shift-V paste variant, kind of like how you can right-click in some editors and select "Paste without formatting" or other paste filters.