From: J.B. Moreno (planb@newsreaders.com)
Date: Sun Feb 16 2003 - 15:42:03 CST
On 2/16/03 11:58 AM, Bruce Lilly at <blilly@erols.com> wrote:
> J.B. Moreno wrote:
>
>> That's not how *I* am reading Bruce Lilly -- it seems to me that he is
>> saying that 7 bits is it (as far as the standard goes) until all of the old
>> software is no longer used.
>
> Not quite. As far as generation of messages is concerned, yes.
> I have no problem with wording indicating future directions,
> or in suggesting UA support for reading raw utf-8.
Indicating future directions is IMO fairly useless unless you are also
/starting/ down that path -- which means generation as well as acceptance.
>> So that even if all of the users decided to
>> switch tomorrow, the standard should stay the same.
>
> 1. There's no indication that users would change
> 2. Regardless of what users do or would like to do, the
> existing infrastructure needs to be considered
The existing infrastructure *already* has to deal with it, because the
existing infrastructure is encountering it somewhere every second of every
day.
Now, some of the infrastructure may not be dealing with it in the best
possible way (IMAP and SMTP dropping bytes), but *is* happening.
(And by the way, if other protocols get to criticize us, I think I should
get to criticize them, and dropping data just because you don't know what to
do with it is *stupid*).
> 3. Forget the idea of a flag day for switching untagged
> charsets; it won't happen (it might be possible to
> have a flag day for turning on support for raw utf-8
> *after* all use of untagged 8-bit content has stopped,
> but that's a different matter).
Good, because I don't like the idea of flag days -- just do it, and accept
that sometimes it'll fail (particularly for news, if you're sending
something that absolutely must not fail to reach it's destination, don't use
news).
>> But the change has to start sometime, and it might as well be now as 10
>> years from now -- because the most significant change between now and then
>> will be how used they are to doing it the way are they are now.
>
> There won't be a change unless there is some pressure for it,
> and untagged content in a "blessed" 8-bit charset won't work
> in the presence of use of 8-bit content in multiple untagged
> charsets. Hand-waving accompanied by the statement "we're
> going to assume all untagged 8-bit content is utf-8" won't
> bring about any change from those using other untagged 8bit
> charsets -- they won't even notice.
A blessed charset *will* work -- in fact that's how most of news currently
handles the situation, we want to define a /new/ blessed charset, one that
is universal instead of a group or hierarchy charset.
The people managing groups (whether officially or through being a netcop)
generally care enough to follow official standards and to put pressure on
others to do the same -- the fact that they aren't doing so now is a clear
indications that the standards have failed to keep up with reality.
-- J.B. Moreno