From owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Apr 28 10:19:16 2009 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4B5391065670 for ; Tue, 28 Apr 2009 10:19:16 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from joerg@britannica.bec.de) Received: from www.sonnenberger.org (www.ostsee-abc.de [62.206.222.50]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id AD8F78FC14 for ; Tue, 28 Apr 2009 10:19:15 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from joerg@britannica.bec.de) Received: from britannica.bec.de (www.sonnenberger.org [192.168.1.10]) by www.sonnenberger.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id F416E6674D for ; Tue, 28 Apr 2009 12:19:12 +0200 (CEST) Received: by britannica.bec.de (Postfix, from userid 1000) id 213DC1BDD7B; Tue, 28 Apr 2009 12:19:20 +0200 (CEST) Date: Tue, 28 Apr 2009 12:19:19 +0200 From: Joerg Sonnenberger To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Message-ID: <20090428101919.GA552@britannica.bec.de> Mail-Followup-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org References: <20090427183836.GA10793@zim.MIT.EDU> <49F5FE45.2090101@freebsd.org> <20090427193326.GA7654@britannica.bec.de> <20090427194904.GA11137@zim.MIT.EDU> <20090427200821.GA6665@britannica.bec.de> <20090428024246.GA12887@zim.MIT.EDU> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20090428024246.GA12887@zim.MIT.EDU> User-Agent: Mutt/1.5.19 (2009-01-05) Subject: Re: SoC 2009: BSD-licensed libiconv in base system X-BeenThere: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Technical Discussions relating to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 28 Apr 2009 10:19:16 -0000 On Mon, Apr 27, 2009 at 10:42:46PM -0400, David Schultz wrote: > On Mon, Apr 27, 2009, Joerg Sonnenberger wrote: > > On Mon, Apr 27, 2009 at 03:49:04PM -0400, David Schultz wrote: > > > ...but isn't this moot at present because there are no > > > widely-accepted encodings that include characters that > > > aren't supported by UCS-4? Citrus doesn't seem to support > > > any such encodings in any case. > > > > "Just" using UCS-4 not necessarily buys you the desired affect. > > Keep in mind that UCS-4 is still a variable width encoding, as soon as > > you factor combining characters and some other interesting parts in. > > This is true, but unfortunately C99 wasn't really designed to > support combining characters. I don't understand how this relates > to the present discussion. The main reason people want to use wchar_t is because they want to use a fixed width presentation of characters. Just using UCS-4 doesn't give you that if you ever want to support Level 2 and higher. It also highlights UCS-4 is not that state independent as it is often thought to be. That is again something undesirable. Joerg