tlug: re: unrecog

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <turnbull@example.com>]

>>>>> "Tony" == Tony Laszlo <laszlo@example.com> writes:

    Tony> Here's another funky one from nifty (I modified the address
    Tony> proper, for privacy's sake). Maybe what I am seeing is a
    Tony> nifty problem?

Strictly speaking, it's probably not Nifty, but "power users" who
found an alternative way of inserting Japanese into their full name
(eg, by editing a mailer config file with Notepad).

>From their point of view, it's a "feature", not a problem.  The idea
is to assume that everyone is either Japanese or American.  This makes
it fairly easy to decide what any given string's encoding is.

Nifty and MS users can get away with putting non-compliant stuff in
their headers and messages because their platforms do this, ahem,
"optimization".  I suspect that both refuse to discourage the practice
because it gives their customers a false sense of superiority:  "my
software can handle garbage that yours can't."

The appropriate reply is:  "And do you eat garbage that I can't, too?"

But it doesn't create much good feeling.

-- 
University of Tsukuba                Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN
Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences       Tel/fax: +81 (298) 53-5091
/* What's the big deal about the millennium? .............................
... I no longer care how many shopping days until the millennial epoch! */
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Next Technical Meeting: January 14 (Fri) 19:00
* Topic: "glibc - current status and future developments"
* Guest Speaker: Ulrich Drepper (Cygnus Solutions)
* Place: Oracle Japan HQ 12F Seminar Room (New Otani Garden Court)
-------------------------------------------------------------------
more info: http://www.tlug.gr.jp        Sponsor: Global Online Japan