Re: UTF-7 - is it dead?

From: saqqara (saqqara@csi.com)
Date: Fri Jun 02 2006 - 07:04:02 CDT

  • Next message: Theodore H. Smith: "UTF-8 can be used for more than it is given credit ( Re: UTF-7 - is it dead? )"

    I recall conversations about the imminent end to 7 bit coding back in 1977
    (it was already pointless except for legacy support). Who'd have guessed 30
    years on the topic would still be alive. The new legacy rationales seem to
    run and run but best to avoid encouraging this by avoiding UTF-7 unless
    absolutely necessary, e.g. wrt some issues associated with email.

    UTF-32 is certainly useful for internal working but sticking with UTF-8 for
    external interfaces and data is a good rule of thumb except where
    compatibility is an issue (e.g. use of UTF-16 with Win32 API). There again,
    there are exceptions to the rules so depends what you are migrating and
    attempting to accomplish.

    Bob Richmond

    ----- Original Message -----
    From: <Kornkreismuster@web.de>
    To: <unicode@unicode.org>
    Sent: Friday, June 02, 2006 8:23 AM
    Subject: UTF-7 - is it dead?

    >
    > Hi!
    >
    > We migrate our systems to Unicode right now.
    > My impression is that we should implement only the UTF-8 and UTF-16
    encodings, because of the rarly use of UTF-32 and UTF-7.
    >
    > UTF-32 is for sure a waste of space. it only makes sense if you really
    have texts out of Hieroglyphs. Therefore it makes no sense for an
    Application with no historical or any other uncommon content.
    >
    > Is UTF-7 really still in use at all? Java for example has only the options
    UTF-8 and 16.
    > And for UTF-7 I found several opinions that BASE64 and QuotePrintable is
    still to be used instead.
    >
    > Regards
    > ______________________________________________________________________
    > XXL-Speicher, PC-Virenschutz, Spartarife & mehr: Nur im WEB.DE Club!
    > Jetzt gratis testen! http://freemail.web.de/home/landingpad/?mc=021130
    >

    This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Fri Jun 02 2006 - 07:04:47 CDT