Groups | Search | Server Info | Keyboard shortcuts | Login | Register [http] [https] [nntp] [nntps]


Groups > comp.lang.java.programmer > #19922

Re: A proposal to handle file encodings

From "Peter J. Holzer" <hjp-usenet2@hjp.at>
Newsgroups comp.lang.java.programmer
Subject Re: A proposal to handle file encodings
Date 2012-11-25 09:57 +0100
Organization LUGA
Message-ID <slrnkb3nc7.qr8.hjp-usenet2@hrunkner.hjp.at> (permalink)
References (1 earlier) <k8o50f$1q6$1@news.albasani.net> <9kava8lk1ignppq7rso7gmcb541gnerf8q@4ax.com> <k8oers$p98$1@news.albasani.net> <slrnkb00l8.jbt.hjp-usenet2@hrunkner.hjp.at> <54n1b8hnhtb4693l7qsbvjelucf99kjnmf@4ax.com>

Show all headers | View raw


On 2012-11-24 14:42, Roedy Green <see_website@mindprod.com.invalid> wrote:
> On Sat, 24 Nov 2012 00:11:36 +0100, "Peter J. Holzer"
><hjp-usenet2@hjp.at> wrote, quoted or indirectly quoted someone who
> said :
>>>> The HTML encoding is incompetent. You can't read it without knowing
>>>> the encoding.
>>
>>Not true in practice. Almost all encodings used in the real world are
>>some superset of ASCII, and you only need to recognize ASCII characters
>>to find the relevant meta tag.
>
> You still have the 8- 16- bit,which you can figure out with the BOM in
> most cases.

In this case the encoding is already known and the meta element must not
be used:

| The META declaration must only be used when the character encoding is
| organized such that ASCII-valued bytes stand for ASCII characters (at
| least until the META element is parsed).
    -- http://www.w3.org/TR/1999/REC-html401-19991224/charset.html

> It is still Mickey Mouse.

That wasn't your claim. Your claim was that it's impossible while all
browsers in the last 15 years or so have demonstrated that it is in
practice possible - on billions of web sites.

> The encoding should be at the very front and encoded in ASCII or
> something fixed.

It is encoded in ASCII, and it 

| should appear as early as possible in the HEAD element.
    -- http://www.w3.org/TR/1999/REC-html401-19991224/charset.html

And of course there is always the HTTP header. In fact your whole
proposal sounds like an extremely simplified version of the MIME header.
Which was invented 20 years ago and is widely used.

And frankly, you picked the least interesting aspect of MIME: You can
just require that UTF-8 is the only permissible encoding for plain text
files. That's much simpler and more likely to be implemented than
requiring the all text files must start with a header declaring the
encoding. At the same time you are missing out on other aspects of plain
text files (e.g., newline as line end vs. paragraph end, flowed) and of
course everything except plain text.

	hp


-- 
   _  | Peter J. Holzer    | Fluch der elektronischen Textverarbeitung:
|_|_) | Sysadmin WSR       | Man feilt solange an seinen Text um, bis
| |   | hjp@hjp.at         | die Satzbestandteile des Satzes nicht mehr
__/   | http://www.hjp.at/ | zusammenpaßt. -- Ralph Babel

Back to comp.lang.java.programmer | Previous | NextPrevious in thread | Next in thread | Find similar | Unroll thread


Thread

A proposal to handle file encodings Roedy Green <see_website@mindprod.com.invalid> - 2012-11-22 13:36 -0800
  Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Joerg Meier <joergmmeier@arcor.de> - 2012-11-22 23:36 +0100
  Re: A proposal to handle file encodings markspace <-@.> - 2012-11-22 17:20 -0800
  Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Arne Vajhøj <arne@vajhoej.dk> - 2012-11-22 20:25 -0500
    Re: A proposal to handle file encodings markspace <-@.> - 2012-11-22 19:47 -0800
      Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Roedy Green <see_website@mindprod.com.invalid> - 2012-11-22 21:28 -0800
        Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2012-11-24 15:51 +0000
          Re: A proposal to handle file encodings "Peter J. Holzer" <hjp-usenet2@hjp.at> - 2012-11-25 10:18 +0100
            Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2012-11-25 18:05 +0000
              Re: A proposal to handle file encodings "Peter J. Holzer" <hjp-usenet2@hjp.at> - 2012-11-27 19:51 +0100
                Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2012-11-29 02:22 +0000
                Re: A proposal to handle file encodings "Peter J. Holzer" <hjp-usenet2@hjp.at> - 2012-12-02 13:02 +0100
                Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2012-12-02 19:36 +0000
                Re: A proposal to handle file encodings "Peter J. Holzer" <hjp-usenet2@hjp.at> - 2012-12-02 23:52 +0100
                Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2012-12-02 23:08 +0000
    Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Sven Köhler <remove-sven.koehler@gmail.com> - 2012-11-25 13:13 +0100
      Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2012-11-25 18:07 +0000
  Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Jan Burse <janburse@fastmail.fm> - 2012-11-23 16:33 +0100
    Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Roedy Green <see_website@mindprod.com.invalid> - 2012-11-23 09:02 -0800
      Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Jan Burse <janburse@fastmail.fm> - 2012-11-23 19:21 +0100
        Re: A proposal to handle file encodings "Peter J. Holzer" <hjp-usenet2@hjp.at> - 2012-11-24 00:11 +0100
          Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Jan Burse <janburse@fastmail.fm> - 2012-11-24 00:53 +0100
            Re: A proposal to handle file encodings "Peter J. Holzer" <hjp-usenet2@hjp.at> - 2012-11-24 09:13 +0100
            Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Roedy Green <see_website@mindprod.com.invalid> - 2012-11-24 06:50 -0800
              Re: A proposal to handle file encodings "Peter J. Holzer" <hjp-usenet2@hjp.at> - 2012-11-25 10:07 +0100
                Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Joshua Cranmer <Pidgeot18@verizon.invalid> - 2012-11-25 11:06 -0600
                Re: A proposal to handle file encodings "Peter J. Holzer" <hjp-usenet2@hjp.at> - 2012-11-27 19:28 +0100
          Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Roedy Green <see_website@mindprod.com.invalid> - 2012-11-24 06:42 -0800
            Re: A proposal to handle file encodings "Peter J. Holzer" <hjp-usenet2@hjp.at> - 2012-11-25 09:57 +0100
          Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Sven Köhler <remove-sven.koehler@gmail.com> - 2012-11-25 15:09 +0100
        Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Sven Köhler <remove-sven.koehler@gmail.com> - 2012-11-25 15:06 +0100
      Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Joshua Cranmer <Pidgeot18@verizon.invalid> - 2012-11-23 16:43 -0600
        Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Jan Burse <janburse@fastmail.fm> - 2012-11-24 01:02 +0100
      Re: A proposal to handle file encodings BGB <cr88192@hotmail.com> - 2012-11-25 14:36 -0600
        Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Joshua Cranmer <Pidgeot18@verizon.invalid> - 2012-11-25 16:51 -0600
          Re: A proposal to handle file encodings BGB <cr88192@hotmail.com> - 2012-11-25 17:54 -0600
          Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Jan Burse <janburse@fastmail.fm> - 2012-11-26 02:03 +0100
            Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Jan Burse <janburse@fastmail.fm> - 2012-11-26 02:20 +0100
              Re: A proposal to handle file encodings Martin Gregorie <martin@address-in-sig.invalid> - 2012-11-26 02:46 +0000

csiph-web