info/why-linux-is-better
1
0
Fork 0
mirror of https://github.com/nbeaver/why-linux-is-better.git synced 2025-08-26 15:24:25 +02:00
Code Issues Releases Wiki Activity

Rearrange and reformat.

Browse Source
This commit is contained in:
Nathaniel Beaver
2015-09-11 19:29:18 -05:00
parent a532149236
commit 478352c8fa
1 changed files with 20 additions and 12 deletions
Download Patch File Download Diff File Expand all files Collapse all files

32
README.rst
View File

@@ -692,26 +692,34 @@ and its various forks are not as mature as the Linux implementation.
UTF-16, not UTF-8.
------------------
If the Windows API were designed today, it would most likely use `UTF-8`_.
The Unicode Consortium primarily `recommends UTF-16`_ for compatibility with Java and the Windows API.
Some `practical reasons for preferring UTF-8`_:
`UTF-8 has many practical advantages`_ over UTF-16.
.. _UTF-8: http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/ucs/utf-8-history.txt
.. _recommends UTF-16: http://www.unicode.org/faq/programming.html#2
.. _practical reasons for preferring UTF-8: https://annevankesteren.nl/2009/09/utf-8-reasons
- It is a superset of ASCII, so it is backwards-compatible with existing text files.
- `Zero bytes do not appear`_ at any point in a valid UTF-8 representation, so ``strcpy()`` still works.
- It is `self-synchronizing`_, i.e. it is possible to resynchronize after a lost or corrupted code point without re-reading the entire string.
- It is more portable because it does not require a `byte-order mark`_ and is less likely to be mistaken for other encodings.
- It is a superset of ASCII,
so it is backwards-compatible with existing text files.
- `Zero bytes do not appear`_ at any point in a valid UTF-8 representation,
so ``strcpy()`` still works.
- It is `self-synchronizing`_, i.e. it is possible to resynchronize
after a lost or corrupted code point without re-reading the entire string.
- It is more portable because it does not require a `byte-order mark`_
and is less likely to be mistaken for other encodings.
- Internet Explorer has been known to have `security issues with UTF-16`_.
.. _UTF-8 has many practical advantages: https://annevankesteren.nl/2009/09/utf-8-reasons
.. _Zero bytes do not appear: https://docs.python.org/2/howto/unicode.html#encodings
.. _self-synchronizing: http://research.swtch.com/utf8
.. _byte-order mark: http://www.unicode.org/faq/utf_bom.html
.. _security issues with UTF-16: http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.ietf.charsets/372
In principle, UTF-16 would have the advantage of constant time addressing of single characters,
If the Windows API were designed today,
it would probably use `UTF-8`_.
The Unicode Consortium primarily `recommends UTF-16`_
for compatibility with Java and the Windows API.
.. _UTF-8: http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/ucs/utf-8-history.txt
.. _recommends UTF-16: http://www.unicode.org/faq/programming.html#2
In principle, UTF-16 would have the advantage
of constant time addressing of single characters,
but in practice most programming languages do not provide data types for this,
with the `exception of Go and rust`_.