Re: [tlug] The 11th Commandment

[Edward Middleton <emiddleton@example.com>]

Josh Glover wrote:
> On 10/04/2008, Edward Middleton <emiddleton@example.com> wrote:
>
>   
> > That being said, this is a reason I don't try to get too religious about Unicode.  For all its
> > goodness it isn't supported as universally at the client end as the
> > local encodings, in any given language.  Which means you end up being
> > forced to choose between good standards or good client support.
> >     
>
> There is an important distinction between being "religious" and being
> pragmatic;

or being religious about being pragmatic ;)

>  I am advocating the latter. Using Unicode internally allows
> you to easily handle clients that do not grok UTF-8 (which non-secular
> Unicoders would designate "b0rk3n") by converting to their charset
> right before you output it.

The first link I posted (*Big5 Vs. Unicode Vs. Netscape 4.x Vs. deadline 
-*2003/5) [1],  I was advocating this approach.  If it wasn't a next day 
sort of problem I would have recommended using Unicode because the 
client problems could have been resolved.

> This approach also confers the bonus of
> allowing you to disregard completely the details of the target
> encoding; you can just consider it a black box and be done with it.  

It is however a judgment call. Things like AJAX or flash have similar 
considerations.  Do you go for

1. lowest common denominator with universal client coverage.
2. more functional for most users with problems for some.
3. more functional for all with increased development cost.

The decision will vary base on the situation.

Edward

1. http://www.tlug.jp/ML/0305/msg00139.html