Re: [wmvs] do we still need charset.cfg to list the "acceptable" character encodings?

Hi Terje, Hi all.

Thanks for the details about how the charsets.cfg came to life.

On May 24, 2007, at 16:40 , Terje Bless wrote:
> charset.cfg is an implementation artifact and reflects limited tools.

I agree with that, and I understand this is why we changed its syntax  
at some point, from

foo I bar
quz X baz

to just

foo = 1
bar = 1
baz = 1

But I think with the technique we now use with Encode, we don't  
actually need a list of the stuff we technically support (encode  
knowns that). What we do need is a list of the stuff we frown upon,  
more or less seriously.

> A “charset.cfg” may still be needed, but then only for “exception”  
> purposes such as bitching about vendor-specific charsets or usage  
> boo boos (the -I variants and some Thai encodings, IIRC).

Right. I'm finalizing a commit that will, in effect:

* send a warning if the encoding alias used is one we know to be  
problematic, and we have a better suggestion

at the moment, that is
x-mac-roman             = macintosh
x-sjis                  = shift_jis
iso8859-1               = iso-8859-1
ascii                   = us-ascii

* send a fatal error if the encoding alias is "wrong per policy".

I don't know of any (do you?) but if we ever find one, the mechanism  
is there.

-- 
olivier