Re: Avatox 1.0: Trouble with encoding in Windows

[Martin Krischik <krischik@users.sourceforge.net>]

Bjï¿œrn Persson wrote:

> Martin Krischik wrote:
>> Bjï¿œrn Persson wrote:
>> 
>>> Theoretically it's better to store the encoding outside the file so that
>>> you can know what encoding to use before you start reading the file.
>>> In practice this is usually impossible.
>> 
>> Actually it is possible. The technique employed is called "extended
>> attributes" and is available for all modern operating systems.
> 
> Will editors, compilers, preprocessors et cetera find the encoding
> setting in the extended attributes and obey it? Will version handlers,
> web browsers and other file transfer programs find the setting and send
> it when uploading? Will they set it correctly when downloading? Will all
> these programs use the same attribute for character encoding or will
> each one do it its own way? Will file managers copy and move the
> extended attributes along with the file?
> 
> In short, is it really possible *in practice*?

Only if the programmers are disciplined enough to consistently use the
features available. So probably: No.

The closest I have ever seen was OS/2. And even there most programmers where
to lazy to look up or set ".TYPE" and used the file extension instead.

Martin
-- 
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