symbols
The following lines caught my attention while browsing source2e while looking for the definition of another command.
\DeclareMathRadical{\sqrtsign}{symbols}{"70}{largesymbols}{"70}
and
\DeclareRobustCommand\sqrt{\@ifnextchar[\@sqrt\sqrtsign}
\def\@sqrt[#1]{\root #1\of}
What was \sqrtsign for? I tried \sqrtsign{x} and it outputs something similar to \sqrt{x}.
What you describe seems similar to the nonmonotonic inference relation symbol used in this paper. The main difference being that this a small space between the two characters, which I think actually looks better than having them touch.
\documentclass{article}
\newcommand*{\nc}[2]{#1\mathbin{\left| \sim \vphantom{#1#2} \right.}#2}%
\begin{document}
$\nc{A}{B} \qquad \nc{\frac{A}{C}}{B}$
\end{document}
Update: Here is a version where both the straight and wavy line are re-sized and the two symbols touch:
I have used \scalebox from the \graphicx package to resize the symbols (resize horizontally for the wavy line and vertically for the vertical bar) based on the height of the operands on either side. The \mathrlap is obtained from a TUGboat 22 article entitled a complement to \smash, \llap, and \rlap. I am not an expert in the use of the rlap type command, so perhaps some of the resize code could be simplified. I also used pgf to do the math, and this is probably overkill but I am more familiar with that then doing math in plain TeX.
\documentclass[border=2pt]{standalone}
\usepackage{amsmath}% only needed for \dfrac
\usepackage{graphicx}% needed for \scalebox
\usepackage{pgf}% needed for the math calculations
% http://math.arizona.edu/~aprl/publications/mathclap/
\def\mathrlap{\mathpalette\mathrlapinternal}%
\def\mathrlapinternal#1#2{\rlap{$\mathsurround=0pt#1{#2}$}}%
\makeatletter
\newdimen\@mydimen%
\newdimen\@myHeightOfBar%
\settoheight{\@myHeightOfBar}{$|$}%
\newcommand{\SetScaleFactor}[1]{%
\settoheight{\@mydimen}{#1}%
\pgfmathsetmacro{\scaleFactor}{\@mydimen/\@myHeightOfBar}%
}%
\newcommand*{\Scale}[2][3]{\scalebox{#1}{\ensuremath{#2}}}%
\newcommand*{\nct}[2]{%
\SetScaleFactor{\vphantom{\ensuremath{#1#2}}}% Compute scale to be applied
#1%
\mathrel{\Scale[\scaleFactor]{|\mathrlap{\kern-0.48ex\sim}\hphantom{\kern-0.41ex\sim}}}%
#2%
}%
\begin{document}
$\nct{a}{b} \qquad \nct{\frac{A}{C}}{B} \qquad \nct{\dfrac{A}{C}}{B}$
\end{document}
An enhanced version of this solution that allows you to specify a character to be placed above and below the wavy line is available at the follow-up question: Symbol for skeptical consequence that matches the turnstile package
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[clock]{ifsym}
\begin{document}
Il est minuit 45 : \showclock{0}{45}
\end{document}
Best Answer
The definition of LaTeX's
\sqrtiswhich means that if the optional argument is used (i.e., if the next character after
\sqrtis[),\@sqrtis used (and this in its turn, uses\root#1\ofwhose definition can be found on page 210 ofsource2e.pdf) to typeset the radical index and the subradical expression; if no optional argument is given,\sqrtsignis used to typeset the subradical expression (\sqrtsigndoesn't allow an optional argument).