Re: Re: Guessing the fallback encoding from the top-level domain name before trying to guess from the browser localization

Henri Sivonen scripsit:

> I think the mission would be completely accomplished if this feature
> allowed for the removal of the character encoding menu from all
> Gecko-based products down the road.

That works only if you can get 100% of the documents on the legacy Web
correctly labeled or correctly guessable.  Until recently, there was a
spectacular bug in Chrome whereby any table-of-contents page generated by
latex2html, e.g. <http://www.r6rs.org/final/html/r6rs/r6rs-Z-H-2.html>,
would show up as Chinese mojibake.  Without the ability to change the
interpretation of the encoding, the only alternative would have been to
load another browser just to read those pages (I used IETab on that site
for a while).

> I've instead taken the stance than neither I nor anyone else should
> have to deal with the complication arising from the character encoding
> menu in the future in Firefox or in another code base.

Users for whom security always trumps accessibility should use
disposable computers or leave the Web to others.

-- 
At the end of the Metatarsal Age, the dinosaurs     John Cowan
abruptly vanished. The theory that a single         cowan@ccil.org
catastrophic event may have been responsible        http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
has been strengthened by the recent discovery of
a worldwide layer of whipped cream marking the
Creosote-Tutelary boundary.             --Science Made Stupid

Received on Thursday, 2 January 2014 23:39:14 UTC