Re: the utf8 flag (was Re: decode_utf8 sets utf8 flag on plain ascii strings)

On Sat, Mar 31, 2007 at 02:33:55AM +0200, Juerd Waalboer
<juerdconvolution.nl> wrote:
> > places where your KOI8 string might get suddenly
upgraded to UTF-8 (and 
> > thus get corrupted because Perl treats it is
ISO-8859-1). Or did I get this 
> > wrong?
> 
> A koi8r string is a byte string. If you keep it
separated from text

Your definiton is completely useless in the real world.
Obviously, a KOI8-R
string is a text string. It contains text characters. End of
story.

> Just like $jpeg_image is a byte string that contains
JPEG data, and this

And it is actually an octet string (it makes no difference
to C, but it
does make a difference in current Perls, or on the wire).

I will not reply to your mails anymore, as you made your
point quite clear
to me: you want behaviour to change dependingon the UTF-X
flag, but you do
not want the programmer to know about that. You also have
very weird ideas
of what programmers should and should not do the defy
reality. I find all
that contradictory, but as you ignore the evidence I
presented and the
question I asked you (JSON::XS example), I see no point in
continuing
talking to you.

(Note: this is not frustrated *plonk*. I don't hate you, I
just think it
is pointless to argue about contradictory statements, and I
think you are
mildly abusive, too, in assuming you know everything and
therefore ingoring
inconvinient questions. Feels to much like a waste of
time).

I also might stay out of this discussion, as I think I made
my points
clear.  If Perl wants to stay broken w.r.t. Unicode
abstraction, it is not
my fault, I tried very hard over the last years to report
bugs, and so
far, all of my bug reports w.r..t unicode were right, so I
just assume I
am not misinformed about how things should work.

Be good, be well!

-- 
                The choice of a
      -----==-     _GNU_
      ----==-- _       generation     Marc Lehmann
      ---==---(_)__  __ ____  __      pcggoof.com
      --==---/ / _ / // / / /      http://schmorp.de/
      -=====/_/_//_/_,_/ /_/_      XX11-RIPE

Marc Lehmann skribis 2007-03-31  2:48 (+0200):
> > A koi8r string is a byte string. If you keep it
separated from text
> Your definiton is completely useless in the real world.
Obviously, a KOI8-R
> string is a text string. It contains text characters.
End of story.

This is a logical thing to say, but unfortunately not very
useful.

The distinction between a text string, and a byte string
representing
text, is actually useful.

> You also have very weird ideas of what programmers
should and should
> not do the defy reality.

Weird ideas, maybe, but at least weird ideas that help
dozens of people
write working and maintainable code.

You don't believe in my weird ideas, fine. But I find it
very
interesting that you run into all these problems with Perl's
unicode
support, while the people who stick to my weird ideas write
lots of code
without that.

> I find all that contradictory, but as you ignore the
evidence I
> presented and the question I asked you (JSON::XS
example), I see no
> point in continuing talking to you.

Unfortunately, I understand very little of the JSON example.
I don't
know JSON and would have to learn about it first.
-- 
korajn salutojn,

  juerd waalboer:  perl hacker  <juerdjuerd.nl>  <http://juerd.nl/sig>
  convolution:     ict solutions and consultancy
<salesconvolution.nl>

Ik vertrouw stemcomputers niet.
Zie <ht
tp://www.wijvertrouwenstemcomputersniet.nl/>.