Re: [tlug] iso-2022-jp and shift-jis on IE and N6

[Jim Breen <jwb@example.com>]

[Micheal E Cooper (Re: [tlug] iso-2022-jp and shift-jis on IE and N6) writes:]
Writing about Micheal's "summary" that ISO-2022-JP was the standard for
WWW pages, I said:
JB > It is not "the standard". It is just one of several encapsulation schemes
JB > for JIS X 0208, etc., and in some ways the least satisfactory.
>> 
>> What do you consider the best? 

Of the encapsulation schemes for JIS X 0208, I prefer EUC. It is far
easier to handle internally than ISO-2022-JP or Shift_JIS, and it
doesn't waste code-space the way Shift_JIS does. I routinely edit files
containing the extra kanji etc. in JIS X 0212, which can't be done with
Shift_JIS.

>> Do you think that Unicode will be the answer
>> to these problems?

Unicode is a totally different coding scheme. As a raw code it has
nothing to do with the encapsulation schemes for JIS X 0208. Insofar as
it has largely settled on a single encapsulation scheme (UTF8), it may
escape the coding snafus that have plagued JIS X 0208.

>> > If NTT/DoCoMo got it wrong, there's no need for everyone else to follow
>> > them down that path.
>> 
>> It does seem very similar to the MS issue. The biggest player unilaterally
>> supports one technology, so everyone follows to reach the largest audience,
>> ignoring the technical merits/ demerits. Like my daddy used to say,
>> "Remember the Golden Rule, boy. Him that's got the gold makes the rules."

Well, as Shimpei has demonstrated, DoCoMo sorts out the codes on email,
so DoCoMo got it half right, which is a relief.

I'm not sure I can ever call DoCoMo "The biggest player" when it comes
to WWW pages. They certainly stuffed up mightily in locking their WWW
subset to Shift_JIS. The code needed to convert between EUC, ISO-2022 and
Shift_JIS is close to trivial. I think it was short sight equivalent to
the early releases of Netscape for Macs, which could also only handle
Japanese in Shift_JIS. Sadly updating the microbrowser on a phone is not
just a simple matter like download and install.

Jim

-- 
Jim Breen  (j.breen@example.com  http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/)
Computer Science & Software Engineering,                Tel: +61 3 9905 3298
P.O Box 26, Monash University,                          Fax: +61 3 9905 5146
Clayton VIC 3800, Australia      ジム・ブリーン@モナシュ大学