Importance of character encoding?

I am making a list of errors in someone else's code. What about this:
outline of existing code
byte[] binaryMssg = "sync/ack".getBytes(); // client
--- DataOutputStreamtream --->
String mssg = new String(byte[] buf); // server
proposed correction:
byte[] binaryMssg = "sync/ack".getBytes(Charset.forName("UTF-16")); // client
--- DataOutputStream --->
String mssg = new String(byte[] buf, Charset.forName("UTF-16")); // server
The original developer omitted character encoding.
I have zero knowledge/experience with character encoding. I only just noticed method overloads that optionally use them. I don't want to look stupid by putting what is really a non-issue on my list. I don't want to look like a jerk and draw attention to something that, in real world usage, is a non-issue. Otherwise, just to be thorough, I would like to put it on my list. I think it might create more robust code? Any comments welcomed.
Finally, I was so surprised to notice Charset is in the nio package and so not available until v1.4. This hints character encodings where not a prioriry for the Java development team. So, since they did not consider it important, perhaps neither should I. While there may be niches for character encoding usage, the normal-case rule is to not use explicit character encoding.

dpxqb wrote:
I am making a list of errors in someone else's code. What about this:
outline of existing code
byte[] binaryMssg = "sync/ack".getBytes(); // client
--- DataOutputStreamtream --->
String mssg = new String(byte[] buf); // server
proposed correction:
byte[] binaryMssg = "sync/ack".getBytes(Charset.forName("UTF-16")); // client
--- DataOutputStream --->
String mssg = new String(byte[] buf, Charset.forName("UTF-16")); // serverMuch much much better but I would use utf-8 since it is usually more compact for western languages.
>
The original developer omitted character encoding.Criminal.
>
I have zero knowledge/experience with character encoding. I only just noticed method overloads that optionally use them. I don't want to look stupid by putting what is really a non-issue on my list. I don't want to look like a jerk and draw attention to something that, in real world usage, is a non-issue. Otherwise, just to be thorough, I would like to put it on my list. I think it might create more robust code? Any comments welcomed.It is correct to define the character encoding to be used if the bytes are being transferred from one computer to another since the two machines may have a different default character encoding.
>
Finally, I was so surprised to notice Charset is in the nio package and so not available until v1.4. This hints character encodings where not a prioriry for the Java development team. So, since they did not consider it important, perhaps neither should I. While there may be niches for character encoding usage, the normal-case rule is to not use explicit character encoding.Character encoding has always been important in Java. One has always been able to explicitly set the character encoding by using a String to define it. For example one could use
byte[] binaryMssg = "sync/ack".getBytes("utf-16"); // client
--- DataOutputStream --->
String mssg = new String(byte[] buf, "UTF-16"); // server

Similar Messages

c:import character encoding problem (utf-8)

Aloha @ all,
I am currently importing a file using the <c:import> functionallity (<c:import url="module/item.jsp" charEncoding="UTF-8">) but it seems that the returned data is not encoded with utf-8 and hence not displayed correctly. The overall file header is:
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Server: Apache-Coyote/1.1
Set-Cookie: JSESSIONID=E67F9DAF44C7F96C0725652BEA1713D8;
Content-Type: text/html;charset=UTF-8
Content-Length: 6861
Date: Thu, 05 Jul 2007 04:18:39 GMT
Connection: close
I've set the file-encoding on all pages to :
<%@ page contentType="text/html;charset=UTF-8" %>
<%@ page pageEncoding="UTF-8"%>
but the error remains... is this a known bug and is there a workaround?

Partially, yes. It turns out that I created the documents in eclipse with a different character encoding. Hence the entire document was actually not UTF-encoded...
So I changed each document encoding in Eclipse to UTF and got it working just fine...

What every developer should know about character encoding

This was originally posted (with better formatting) at Moderator edit: link removed/what-every-developer-should-know-about-character-encoding.html. I'm posting because lots of people trip over this.
If you write code that touches a text file, you probably need this.
Lets start off with two key items
1.Unicode does not solve this issue for us (yet).
2.Every text file is encoded. There is no such thing as an unencoded file or a "general" encoding.
And lets add a codacil to this – most Americans can get by without having to take this in to account – most of the time. Because the characters for the first 127 bytes in the vast majority of encoding schemes map to the same set of characters (more accurately called glyphs). And because we only use A-Z without any other characters, accents, etc. – we're good to go. But the second you use those same assumptions in an HTML or XML file that has characters outside the first 127 – then the trouble starts.
The computer industry started with diskspace and memory at a premium. Anyone who suggested using 2 bytes for each character instead of one would have been laughed at. In fact we're lucky that the byte worked best as 8 bits or we might have had fewer than 256 bits for each character. There of course were numerous charactersets (or codepages) developed early on. But we ended up with most everyone using a standard set of codepages where the first 127 bytes were identical on all and the second were unique to each set. There were sets for America/Western Europe, Central Europe, Russia, etc.
And then for Asia, because 256 characters were not enough, some of the range 128 – 255 had what was called DBCS (double byte character sets). For each value of a first byte (in these higher ranges), the second byte then identified one of 256 characters. This gave a total of 128 * 256 additional characters. It was a hack, but it kept memory use to a minimum. Chinese, Japanese, and Korean each have their own DBCS codepage.
And for awhile this worked well. Operating systems, applications, etc. mostly were set to use a specified code page. But then the internet came along. A website in America using an XML file from Greece to display data to a user browsing in Russia, where each is entering data based on their country – that broke the paradigm.
Fast forward to today. The two file formats where we can explain this the best, and where everyone trips over it, is HTML and XML. Every HTML and XML file can optionally have the character encoding set in it's header metadata. If it's not set, then most programs assume it is UTF-8, but that is not a standard and not universally followed. If the encoding is not specified and the program reading the file guess wrong – the file will be misread.
Point 1 – Never treat specifying the encoding as optional when writing a file. Always write it to the file. Always. Even if you are willing to swear that the file will never have characters out of the range 1 – 127.
Now lets' look at UTF-8 because as the standard and the way it works, it gets people into a lot of trouble. UTF-8 was popular for two reasons. First it matched the standard codepages for the first 127 characters and so most existing HTML and XML would match it. Second, it was designed to use as few bytes as possible which mattered a lot back when it was designed and many people were still using dial-up modems.
UTF-8 borrowed from the DBCS designs from the Asian codepages. The first 128 bytes are all single byte representations of characters. Then for the next most common set, it uses a block in the second 128 bytes to be a double byte sequence giving us more characters. But wait, there's more. For the less common there's a first byte which leads to a sersies of second bytes. Those then each lead to a third byte and those three bytes define the character. This goes up to 6 byte sequences. Using the MBCS (multi-byte character set) you can write the equivilent of every unicode character. And assuming what you are writing is not a list of seldom used Chinese characters, do it in fewer bytes.
But here is what everyone trips over – they have an HTML or XML file, it works fine, and they open it up in a text editor. They then add a character that in their text editor, using the codepage for their region, insert a character like ß and save the file. Of course it must be correct – their text editor shows it correctly. But feed it to any program that reads according to the encoding and that is now the first character fo a 2 byte sequence. You either get a different character or if the second byte is not a legal value for that first byte – an error.
Point 2 – Always create HTML and XML in a program that writes it out correctly using the encode. If you must create with a text editor, then view the final file in a browser.
Now, what about when the code you are writing will read or write a file? We are not talking binary/data files where you write it out in your own format, but files that are considered text files. Java, .NET, etc all have character encoders. The purpose of these encoders is to translate between a sequence of bytes (the file) and the characters they represent. Lets take what is actually a very difficlut example – your source code, be it C#, Java, etc. These are still by and large "plain old text files" with no encoding hints. So how do programs handle them? Many assume they use the local code page. Many others assume that all characters will be in the range 0 – 127 and will choke on anything else.
Here's a key point about these text files – every program is still using an encoding. It may not be setting it in code, but by definition an encoding is being used.
Point 3 – Always set the encoding when you read and write text files. Not just for HTML & XML, but even for files like source code. It's fine if you set it to use the default codepage, but set the encoding.
Point 4 – Use the most complete encoder possible. You can write your own XML as a text file encoded for UTF-8. But if you write it using an XML encoder, then it will include the encoding in the meta data and you can't get it wrong. (it also adds the endian preamble to the file.)
Ok, you're reading & writing files correctly but what about inside your code. What there? This is where it's easy – unicode. That's what those encoders created in the Java & .NET runtime are designed to do. You read in and get unicode. You write unicode and get an encoded file. That's why the char type is 16 bits and is a unique core type that is for characters. This you probably have right because languages today don't give you much choice in the matter.
Point 5 – (For developers on languages that have been around awhile) – Always use unicode internally. In C++ this is called wide chars (or something similar). Don't get clever to save a couple of bytes, memory is cheap and you have more important things to do.
Wrapping it up
I think there are two key items to keep in mind here. First, make sure you are taking the encoding in to account on text files. Second, this is actually all very easy and straightforward. People rarely screw up how to use an encoding, it's when they ignore the issue that they get in to trouble.
Edited by: Darryl Burke -- link removed

DavidThi808 wrote:
This was originally posted (with better formatting) at Moderator edit: link removed/what-every-developer-should-know-about-character-encoding.html. I'm posting because lots of people trip over this.
If you write code that touches a text file, you probably need this.
Lets start off with two key items
1.Unicode does not solve this issue for us (yet).
2.Every text file is encoded. There is no such thing as an unencoded file or a "general" encoding.
And lets add a codacil to this – most Americans can get by without having to take this in to account – most of the time. Because the characters for the first 127 bytes in the vast majority of encoding schemes map to the same set of characters (more accurately called glyphs). And because we only use A-Z without any other characters, accents, etc. – we're good to go. But the second you use those same assumptions in an HTML or XML file that has characters outside the first 127 – then the trouble starts. Pretty sure most Americans do not use character sets that only have a range of 0-127. I don't think I have every used a desktop OS that did. I might have used some big iron boxes before that but at that time I wasn't even aware that character sets existed.
They might only use that range but that is a different issue, especially since that range is exactly the same as the UTF8 character set anyways.
>
The computer industry started with diskspace and memory at a premium. Anyone who suggested using 2 bytes for each character instead of one would have been laughed at. In fact we're lucky that the byte worked best as 8 bits or we might have had fewer than 256 bits for each character. There of course were numerous charactersets (or codepages) developed early on. But we ended up with most everyone using a standard set of codepages where the first 127 bytes were identical on all and the second were unique to each set. There were sets for America/Western Europe, Central Europe, Russia, etc.
And then for Asia, because 256 characters were not enough, some of the range 128 – 255 had what was called DBCS (double byte character sets). For each value of a first byte (in these higher ranges), the second byte then identified one of 256 characters. This gave a total of 128 * 256 additional characters. It was a hack, but it kept memory use to a minimum. Chinese, Japanese, and Korean each have their own DBCS codepage.
And for awhile this worked well. Operating systems, applications, etc. mostly were set to use a specified code page. But then the internet came along. A website in America using an XML file from Greece to display data to a user browsing in Russia, where each is entering data based on their country – that broke the paradigm.
The above is only true for small volume sets. If I am targeting a processing rate of 2000 txns/sec with a requirement to hold data active for seven years then a column with a size of 8 bytes is significantly different than one with 16 bytes.
Fast forward to today. The two file formats where we can explain this the best, and where everyone trips over it, is HTML and XML. Every HTML and XML file can optionally have the character encoding set in it's header metadata. If it's not set, then most programs assume it is UTF-8, but that is not a standard and not universally followed. If the encoding is not specified and the program reading the file guess wrong – the file will be misread.
The above is out of place. It would be best to address this as part of Point 1.
Point 1 – Never treat specifying the encoding as optional when writing a file. Always write it to the file. Always. Even if you are willing to swear that the file will never have characters out of the range 1 – 127.
Now lets' look at UTF-8 because as the standard and the way it works, it gets people into a lot of trouble. UTF-8 was popular for two reasons. First it matched the standard codepages for the first 127 characters and so most existing HTML and XML would match it. Second, it was designed to use as few bytes as possible which mattered a lot back when it was designed and many people were still using dial-up modems.
UTF-8 borrowed from the DBCS designs from the Asian codepages. The first 128 bytes are all single byte representations of characters. Then for the next most common set, it uses a block in the second 128 bytes to be a double byte sequence giving us more characters. But wait, there's more. For the less common there's a first byte which leads to a sersies of second bytes. Those then each lead to a third byte and those three bytes define the character. This goes up to 6 byte sequences. Using the MBCS (multi-byte character set) you can write the equivilent of every unicode character. And assuming what you are writing is not a list of seldom used Chinese characters, do it in fewer bytes.
The first part of that paragraph is odd. The first 128 characters of unicode, all unicode, is based on ASCII. The representational format of UTF8 is required to implement unicode, thus it must represent those characters. It uses the idiom supported by variable width encodings to do that.
But here is what everyone trips over – they have an HTML or XML file, it works fine, and they open it up in a text editor. They then add a character that in their text editor, using the codepage for their region, insert a character like ß and save the file. Of course it must be correct – their text editor shows it correctly. But feed it to any program that reads according to the encoding and that is now the first character fo a 2 byte sequence. You either get a different character or if the second byte is not a legal value for that first byte – an error.
Not sure what you are saying here. If a file is supposed to be in one encoding and you insert invalid characters into it then it invalid. End of story. It has nothing to do with html/xml.
Point 2 – Always create HTML and XML in a program that writes it out correctly using the encode. If you must create with a text editor, then view the final file in a browser.
The browser still needs to support the encoding.
Now, what about when the code you are writing will read or write a file? We are not talking binary/data files where you write it out in your own format, but files that are considered text files. Java, .NET, etc all have character encoders. The purpose of these encoders is to translate between a sequence of bytes (the file) and the characters they represent. Lets take what is actually a very difficlut example – your source code, be it C#, Java, etc. These are still by and large "plain old text files" with no encoding hints. So how do programs handle them? Many assume they use the local code page. Many others assume that all characters will be in the range 0 – 127 and will choke on anything else.
I know java files have a default encoding - the specification defines it. And I am certain C# does as well.
Point 3 – Always set the encoding when you read and write text files. Not just for HTML & XML, but even for files like source code. It's fine if you set it to use the default codepage, but set the encoding.
It is important to define it. Whether you set it is another matter.
Point 4 – Use the most complete encoder possible. You can write your own XML as a text file encoded for UTF-8. But if you write it using an XML encoder, then it will include the encoding in the meta data and you can't get it wrong. (it also adds the endian preamble to the file.)
Ok, you're reading & writing files correctly but what about inside your code. What there? This is where it's easy – unicode. That's what those encoders created in the Java & .NET runtime are designed to do. You read in and get unicode. You write unicode and get an encoded file. That's why the char type is 16 bits and is a unique core type that is for characters. This you probably have right because languages today don't give you much choice in the matter.
Unicode character escapes are replaced prior to actual code compilation. Thus it is possible to create strings in java with escaped unicode characters which will fail to compile.
Point 5 – (For developers on languages that have been around awhile) – Always use unicode internally. In C++ this is called wide chars (or something similar). Don't get clever to save a couple of bytes, memory is cheap and you have more important things to do.
No. A developer should understand the problem domain represented by the requirements and the business and create solutions that appropriate to that. Thus there is absolutely no point for someone that is creating an inventory system for a stand alone store to craft a solution that supports multiple languages.
And another example is with high volume systems moving/storing bytes is relevant. As such one must carefully consider each text element as to whether it is customer consumable or internally consumable. Saving bytes in such cases will impact the total load of the system. In such systems incremental savings impact operating costs and marketing advantage with speed.

Character encoding issue in sql server

Hi Team,
We have a table with more than 20 columns...In that we have some columns which will have data extracted from the Datawareshouse applicances and its one time load.
The problem is we have two columns which will may have same set of values from some records and for different set of records
the below values are the example for same set of records but the values are changed while importing into the sql server database..
2pk Etiquetas Navide‰as 3000-HG
2pk Etiquetas Navideñas 3000-H
Is there anyway to change the first column values into the second column value ?
By looking at the data we can say its the code page issue..(Character encoding issue)..but how to convert it?
Convertting(2pk Etiquetas Navide‰as 3000-HG)
to get 2pk Etiquetas Navideñas 3000-H in the select query?

Then it seems that you can do the obvious: replace it.
DECLARE @Sample TABLE ( Payload NVARCHAR(255) );
INSERT INTO @Sample
VALUES ( N'2pk Etiquetas Navide‰as 3000-HG' );
UPDATE @Sample
SET Payload = REPLACE(Payload, N'‰', N'ñ');
SELECT S.Payload
FROM @Sample S;

ITunes support for foriegn character encoding

A friend burned two mix cds for me to listen two on my move back to the US from Korea. The songs are korean and have korean title/album information. I thought I would import the songs into my iBook. When I add them to my library, however, a majority of them have unintelligible song information. Only about 25-30% of the songs import successfully in korean font.
Finder reads the cd no problems. Looking through the disc shows all information clearly. Drop them into iTunes, however (or selecting "add to library"), and they get scrambled.
I'm guessing this is a character encoding issue. I don't know where my friend got the tracks from, so I'll have to assume he got them from sources which copied them using different encoding methods. But if Finder can support them all, why can't iTunes? Is there a way I can adjust character support in iTunes? Or should I be looking at something else?
1.2ghz iBook G4 1.25gb RAM Mac OS X (10.4.5) iTunes 6.0.3

Try setting the Encoding of your Outputstream to UTF-8.

Character Encoding doubt

Hi Friends,
I need to do this part in my programs
"The string should take a parameter i.e upto 20 bytes long.And it must be encoded as character sequence using the "US-ASCII" standard character encoding.The unused bytes must be filled with space character."I tried doing this:
String parameter = "Hello";
byte[] beta = new byte[20];
Char[] ch = parameter.toCharArray();
beta = parameter.getBytes();Is this the write way,and do i need to set the encoding to "US-ASCII" .if yes,how to do that??Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks

Thanks sabre,
I got one small doubt more..would appreciate if anybody would help..
So,I created a class to send the data,but i have some problems receiving the data back from the server.This is my class:
import java.net.*;
import java.io.*;
public class SocketCat {
public static void main(String[] args) {
                                          String parameter = "Tester                              ";
          byte[] buf = new byte[40];
          try{
          buf = parameter.getBytes("ASCII");
          }catch(Exception e){
          e.printStackTrace();
     try{
            // get a datagram socket
        DatagramSocket socket = new DatagramSocket();
            // send request
        InetAddress address = InetAddress.getByName("localhost");
        DatagramPacket packet = new DatagramPacket(buf, buf.length, address, 3590);
        socket.send(packet);
         byte[] buffer = new byte[2000];
        // get response
        packet = new DatagramPacket(buffer, buffer.length);
        socket.receive(packet);
        // display response
        String received = new String(packet.getData(),"ASCII");
        System.out.println("Data Recd: " + received);
             socket.close();
        }catch(Exception e){
          e.printStackTrace();
}I would like to change this line:
byte[] buffer = new byte[2000];to be initialised to the same size as the size of incoming data...is there any way to do so???
And I am getting some strange characters I don't know why,am i doin anything wrong here??
thanks

Character encoding format in j2me

Hi,
I am new to this forum.
I have some queries regarding Character encoding support in j2me.
1. What is the character encoding format supported in j2me?
2. Is it varies from device to device or same in all j2me devices?
3. Whether all j2me devices support UTF-8 format?
4. Are some devices sopport UTF-16 (or UTF-16BE/UTF-16LE)?
5. If a device supports UTF-8 scheme, can we assume that it will support all the languages(i am somehow concerned for Chineese)?
Eagerly waiting for the feedbacks :)

Not all devices has support for even UTF-8.
Use this class I wrote for my projects. This is implementation of Reader so you may easy use it anywhere.
* Created on 12.03.2008 14:21
package misc;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.InputStream;
import java.io.Reader;
* Reader of UTF-8 encoded string from bytes
* @author RFK
public class UTF8InputStreamReader extends Reader{
InputStream is;
/** Creates a new instance of UTF8InputStreamReader */
public UTF8InputStreamReader(InputStream is) {
    this.is=is;
public int read(char[] cbuf, int off, int len) throws IOException {
    int b,b2,b3, r=0;
    while (len>0){
      b = is.read();
      if (b<0) break;
      if (b<128)
        cbuf[off]= (char)b;
      else if (b<224){
        b2 = is.read();
        cbuf[off]= (char)(((b& 0x1F) << 6) | (b2 & 0x3F));
      } else {
        b2 = is.read();
        b3 = is.read();
        cbuf[off]= (char)(((b & 0x0F) << 12) | ((b2 & 0x3F) << 6) | (b3 & 0x3F));
      r++;
      off++;
      len--;
    return r;
public void close() throws IOException {
    is.close();
}Edited by: MagDel on Jun 1, 2009 10:33 PM

Setting DEFAULT character encoding ???

To set the default character encoding to UTF-8 for JVM I can do the
following on Solaris:
LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8; java ....
How do I achieve the same on Windows?
Is there a java property where I can specify the default character
encoding or do I have to getBytes( str, "UTF-8") everywhere?
Thanks,
Artur...

Hi Artur,
there is a way. The property is file.encoding. Example:
import java.io.*;
public class ShowEncoding {
public static void main(String[] args) {
System.out.println("Default encoding: " +
new InputStreamReader(System.in).getEncoding());
}On my system I get the following results:
java ShowEncoding Default encoding: Cp1252
java -Dfile.encoding=UTF-8 ShowEncoding Default encoding: UTF8
java -Dfile.encoding=Latin1 ShowEncoding Default encoding: ISO8859_1I don't know, if setting this property using the -D argument is documented or implementation-independendent. But so far, it was working for me. For setting the locale, you may use the properties user.language and user.region. But this is undocumented and implementation-dependendent.
I wouldn't use these properties at all. I would rather specify the encoding in all constructors. Probably using an application property file.
Good luck!
Marcus.

Why, after all these years, can't Thunderbird auto-detect character encoding

judging by all the existing messages and complaints about this, not to mention erroneous posts that say the problem is solved when it isn't, I have to conclude Mozilla either doesn't believe this is a problem or doesn't care to fix it. The bottom line is that there is no way to tell Thunderbird to automatically display emails in the character coding format they were written in. I could understand cases where the headers are not properly filled in, but I see tons of emails in which the encoding is plainly there in the headers within the message source. You can force it, but if you do so via the menu VIEW->Character Encoding->UTF8 (for example) it won't "stick" if you view another message. But who would want it to "stick" permanently anyway? What the average user really wants is to be able to toggle VIEW->Character Encoding->Auto Detect from its default "off" to simply "on", and not have to bother with it anymore.
This is a problem that seems to have gone on forever, and it NEVER happens with other email clients. If there is some backdoor way to actually make autodetect work, I'd appreciate knowing about it. But more important, I think ALL users would appreciate it if it were not some secret "backdoor" setting, but a simple global menu choice for all accounts. Can Mozilla please fix this problem once and for all?

You said...
''Thunderbird is supposed to be using the encoding in the mail.''
I figured is "should", i'm just reporting that it doesn't
You said...
''Setting auto detect to on disables that.''
Please explain. I've looked at every setting I can find and there is no way to set auto detect to "ON". I DID try setting it to "universal" in an attempt top solve the problem, but I have since restored it to "off", because the universal setting doesn't help.
you said...
''"Based on your earlier response I assume you need to press the F10 key to see the tools menu you were refered to." ''
No... I never said that anywhere. I DID refer to Menu->View_>Character Encoding, and I did refer to right clicking on individual folders, to get to the properties dialog, and the general information tab. But F-10 doesn't do anything
You said...
''I have examines dozens of mails in my inbox and each honours the character encoding set in the HTML''
Well, mine NEVER did. A short example from an email I got today pretty much is exemplative of all mail I get from GMAIL...
--089e013a0572a067a404fc73ceda
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
Ok, very good. Thank you. Phoenix sent you a friend request on Facebook by
the way. Talk to you soon.
--089e013a0572a067a404fc73ceda
Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
<p dir=3D"ltr">Ok, very good. Thank you. Phoenix sent you a friend request=
=C2=A0 on Facebook by the way.=C2=A0 Talk to you soon.</p>
--089e013a0572a067a404fc73ceda--
See those incidences pf "=C2=A0"? Each one displays as a strange character, a capitol A with a curved line over it. If I manually set my default encoding to UTF 8, the weird characters go away. If I leave it as Western, there is nothing I can do to tell Thunderbird to "auto detect".
Anyway, I suppose at this point that no one responsible for the product coding is seriously looking at my issue, which is why its never been solved. If anyone does intend to help track it down and solve it, I'll be happy to provide all the examples and screen shots they ask for. Otherwise.

XML Character Encoding Using UTL_DBWS

Hi,
I have a database with WINDOWS-1252 character encoding. I'm using UTL_DBWS to call a web service method which echoes a given string. For this purpose, I do the following:
DECLARE
    v_wsdl CONSTANT VARCHAR2(500) := 'http://myhost/myservice?wsdl';
    v_namespace CONSTANT VARCHAR2(500) := 'my.namespace';
    v_service_name CONSTANT UTL_DBWS.QNAME := UTL_DBWS.to_qname(v_namespace, 'MyService');
    v_service_port CONSTANT UTL_DBWS.QNAME := UTL_DBWS.to_qname(v_namespace, 'MySoapServicePort');
    v_ping CONSTANT UTL_DBWS.QNAME := UTL_DBWS.to_qname(v_namespace, 'ping');
    v_wsdl_uri CONSTANT URITYPE := URIFACTORY.getURI(v_wsdl);
    v_str_request CONSTANT VARCHAR2(4000) :=
'<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<ping>
    <pingRequest>
        <echoData>Dev Team üöäß</echoData>
    </pingRequest>
</ping>';
    v_service UTL_DBWS.SERVICE;
    v_call UTL_DBWS.CALL;
    v_request XMLTYPE := XMLTYPE (v_str_request);
    v_response SYS.XMLTYPE;
BEGIN
    DBMS_JAVA.set_output(20000);
    UTL_DBWS.set_logger_level('FINE');
    v_service := UTL_DBWS.create_service(v_wsdl_uri, v_service_name);
    v_call := UTL_DBWS.create_call(v_service, v_service_port, v_ping);
    UTL_DBWS.set_property(v_call, 'oracle.webservices.charsetEncoding', 'UTF-8');
    v_response := UTL_DBWS.invoke(v_call, v_request);
    DBMS_OUTPUT.put_line(v_response.getStringVal());
    UTL_DBWS.release_call(v_call);
    UTL_DBWS.release_all_services;
END;
/Here is the SERVER OUTPUT:
ServiceFacotory: oracle.j2ee.ws.client.ServiceFactoryImpl@a9deba8d
WSDL: http://myhost/myservice?wsdl
Service: oracle.j2ee.ws.client.dii.ConfiguredService@c881d39e
*** Created service: -2121202561 - oracle.jpub.runtime.dbws.DbwsProxy$ServiceProxy@afb58220 ***
ServiceProxy.get(-2121202561) = oracle.jpub.runtime.dbws.DbwsProxy$ServiceProxy@afb58220
Collection Call info: port={my.namespace}MySoapServicePort, operation={my.namespace}ping, returnType={my.namespace}PingResponse, params count=1
setProperty(oracle.webservices.charsetEncoding, UTF-8)
dbwsproxy.add.map: ns, my.namespace
Attribute 0: my.namespace: xmlns:ns, my.namespace
dbwsproxy.lookup.map: ns, my.namespace
createElement(ns:ping,null,my.namespace)
dbwsproxy.add.soap.element.namespace: ns, my.namespace
Attribute 0: my.namespace: xmlns:ns, my.namespace
dbwsproxy.element.node.child.3: 1, null
createElement(echoData,null,null)
dbwsproxy.text.node.child.0: 3, Dev Team üöäß
request:
<ns:ping xmlns:ns="my.namespace">
   <pingRequest>
      <echoData>Dev Team Ã¼Ã¶Ã¤ÃŸ</echoData>
   </pingRequest>
</ns:ping>
Jul 8, 2008 6:58:49 PM oracle.j2ee.ws.client.StreamingSender _sendImpl
FINE: StreamingSender.response:<?xml version = '1.0' encoding = 'UTF-8'?>
<env:Envelope xmlns:env="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/"><env:Header/><env:Body><ns0:pingResponse xmlns:ns0="my.namespace"><pingResponse><responseTimeMillis>0</responseTimeMillis><resultCode>0</resultCode><echoData>Dev Team Ã¼Ã¶Ã¤ÃŸ</echoData></pingResponse></ns0:pingResponse></env:Body></env:Envelope>
response:
<ns0:pingResponse xmlns:ns0="my.namespace">
   <pingResponse>
      <responseTimeMillis>0</responseTimeMillis>
      <resultCode>0</resultCode>
      <echoData>Dev Team Ã¼Ã¶Ã¤ÃŸ</echoData>
   </pingResponse>
</ns0:pingResponse>As you can see the character encoding is broken in the request and in the response, i.e. the SOAP encoder does not take into consideration the UTF-8 encoding.
I tracked down the problem to the method oracle.jpub.runtime.dbws.DbwsProxy.dom2SOAP(org.w3c.dom.Node, java.util.Hashtable); and more specifically to the calls of oracle.j2ee.ws.saaj.soap.soap11.SOAPFactory11.
My question is: is there a way to make the SOAP encoder use the correct character encoding?
Thanks a lot in advance!
Greetings,
Dimitar

I found a workaround of the problem:
    v_response := XMLType(v_response.getBlobVal(NLS_CHARSET_ID('CHAR_CS')), NLS_CHARSET_ID('AL32UTF8'));Ugly, but I'm tired of decompiling and debugging Java classes ;)
Greetings,
Dimitar

XML parser not detecting character encoding

Hi,
I am using Jdeveloper 9.0.5 preview and the same problem is happening in our production AS 9.0.2 release.
The character encoding of an xml document is not correctly being detected by the oracle v2 parser even though the xml declaration correctly contains
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1" ?>
instead it treats the document as UTF8 encoding which is fine until a document comes along with an extended character which then causes a
java.io.UTFDataFormatException: Invalid UTF8 encoding.
at oracle.xml.parser.v2.XMLUTF8Reader.checkUTF8Byte(XMLUTF8Reader.java:160)
at oracle.xml.parser.v2.XMLUTF8Reader.readUTF8Char(XMLUTF8Reader.java:187)
at oracle.xml.parser.v2.XMLUTF8Reader.fillBuffer(XMLUTF8Reader.java:120)
at oracle.xml.parser.v2.XMLByteReader.saveBuffer(XMLByteReader.java:448)
at oracle.xml.parser.v2.XMLReader.fillBuffer(XMLReader.java:2023)
at oracle.xml.parser.v2.XMLReader.tryRead(XMLReader.java:972)
at oracle.xml.parser.v2.XMLReader.scanXMLDecl(XMLReader.java:2589)
at oracle.xml.parser.v2.XMLReader.pushXMLReader(XMLReader.java:485)
at oracle.xml.parser.v2.XMLReader.pushXMLReader(XMLReader.java:192)
at oracle.xml.parser.v2.XMLParser.parse(XMLParser.java:144)
as you can see it is explicitly casting the XMLUTF8Reader to perform the read.
I can get around this by hard coding the xml input stream to be processed by a reader
XMLSource = new StreamSource(new InputStreamReader(XMLInStream,"ISO-8859-1"));
however the manual documents that the character encoding is automatically picked up from the xml file and casting into a reader is not necessary, so I should be able to write
XMLSource = new StreamSource(XMLInStream)
Does anyone else experience this same problem?
having to hardcode the encoding causes my software to lose flexibility.
Jarrod Sharp.

An XML document should be created with 'ISO-8859-1' encoding to be parsed as 'ISO-8859-1' encoding.

What's the difference of character encoding between 1.4.0and1.4.2 in Linux

As i find, the character encoding about chinese in jdk1.4.2 no langer the same of jdk1.4.0.
In jdk1.4.0, the character encoding used the "file.encoding" system property, we often set the
property with "gb2312".
But in jdk1.4.2, i find that the default character encoding no longer used the "file.encoding" system property.
Who knows the reason?
Test Program:
public class B{
public static void main(String args[]) throws Exception{
byte [] bytes = new byte[]{(byte)0xD6,(byte)0xD0,(byte)0xCE,(byte)0xC4};
String s1 = new String(bytes);
String s2 = new String(bytes,System.getProperty("file.encoding"));
System.out.println("s1="+s1+" , s2="+s2);
System.out.println("s1.length=" + s1.length() + " , s2.length="+s2.length());
run four times and the result list:
[root@app15 component]# /usr/local/j2sdk1.4.0/bin/java -Dfile.encoding=ISO-8859-1 -cp . B
s1=中文 , s2=中文
s1.length=4 , s2.length=4
[root@app15 component]# /usr/local/j2sdk1.4.0/bin/java -Dfile.encoding=gb2312 -cp . B
s1=中文 , s2=中文
s1.length=2 , s2.length=2
[root@app15 component]# /usr/local/j2sdk1.4.2/bin/java -Dfile.encoding=ISO-8859-1 -cp . B
s1=中文 , s2=中文
s1.length=4 , s2.length=4
[root@app15 component]# /usr/local/j2sdk1.4.2/bin/java -Dfile.encoding=gb2312 -cp . B
s1=中文 , s2=??
s1.length=4 , s2.length=2
[root@app15 component]#

I don't know for sure, but:
-- The API documentation for String says that "new String(byte[])" uses "the platform's default charset".
-- The API documentation for Charset says "The default charset is determined during virtual-machine startup and typically depends upon the locale and charset being used by the underlying operating system."
You'll notice that it doesn't say anything about using the file.encoding system value, so presumably (based on your experiments) it doesn't. I did a search for "java default charset" and didn't find anything specific, but this site says "As of Java 1.4.1, the default Charset varies from platform to platform" and suggests you explicitly hard-code your charset. I would agree with that.

Why differing Character Encoding and how to fix it?

I have PRS-950 and PRS-350 readers, both since 2011.
In the last year, I've been getting books with Character Encoding that is not easy to read. In playing around with my browsers and View -> Encoding menus, I have figured out that it has something to do with the character encoding within the epub files.
I buy books from several ebook stores and I borrow from the library.
The problem may be the entire book, but it is usually restricted to a few chapters, with rare occasion where the encoding changes within a chapter. Usually it is for a whole chapter, not part, and it can be seen in chapters not consecutive to each other.
It occurs whether the book is downloaded directly to my 950 reader or if I load it to either reader from my computer(s), which are all Mac OS X of several versions fom 10.4 to Mountain Lion. SInce it happens when the book is downloaded directly, I figure the operating system of my computer is not relevant.
There are several publishers involved, though Baen (no DRM ebooks) has not so far been one of them.
If I look at the books with viewers on the computer, the encoding is the same. I've read them in Calibre, in the Sony Reader App, and in Adobe Digital Editions 2.0. It's always the same.
I believe the encoding is inherent to the files. I would like to fix this if I can to make the books I've purchased, many of them in paper and electronically, more enjoyable to read on my readers.
Example: Iâ€™ve is printed instead of I've.
â€™ for apostrophe
â€œ the opening of a quotation,
â€? for closing the quotation,
and I think â€” is for a hyphen.
When a sentence had â€œâ€™m for " 'm at the beginning of a speech (when the character was slurring his words) it took me a while to figure out how it was supposed to read.
â€œâ€™Sides, â€™tis only for a moon. That ainâ€™t long.â€?
was in one recent book.
Translation: " 'Sides, 'tis only for a moon. That ain't long."
See what I mean?
Any ideas?

Hi
I wonder if it’s possible to download a free ebook with such issue, in order to make some “tests”.
Perhaps it’s possible, on free ebooks (without DRM), to add fonts by using softwares like Sigil.

How can I tell what character encoding is sent from the browser?

Hi,
I am developing a servlet which supposed to be used to send and receive message
in multiple character set. However, I read from the previous postings that each
Weblogic Server can only support one input character encoding. Is that true?
And do you have any suggestions on how I can do what I want. For example, I
have a HTML form for people to post any comments (they may post in any characterset,
like ShiftJIS, Big5, Gb, etc). I need to know what character encoding they are
using before I can read that correctly in the servlet and save in the database.

From what I understand (I haven't used it yet) 6.1 supports the 2.3
servlet spec. That should have a method to set the encoding.
Otherwise, I don't think you can support multiple encodings in one
instance of WebLogic.
From what I know browsers don't give any indication at all about what
encoding they're using. I've read some chatter about the HTTP spec
being changed so it's always UTF-8, but that's a Some Day(TM) kind of
thing, so you're stuck with all the stuff out there now which doesn't do
everything in UTF-8.
Sorry for the bad news, but if it makes you feel any better I've felt
your pain. Oh, and trying to process multipart/form-data (file upload)
forms is even worse and from what I've seen the API that people talk
about on these newsgroups assumes everything is ISO-8859-1.
Emmy Lau wrote:
>
Hi,
I am developing a servlet which supposed to be used to send and receive message
in multiple character set. However, I read from the previous postings that each
Weblogic Server can only support one input character encoding. Is that true?
And do you have any suggestions on how I can do what I want. For example, I
have a HTML form for people to post any comments (they may post in any characterset,
like ShiftJIS, Big5, Gb, etc). I need to know what character encoding they are
using before I can read that correctly in the servlet and save in the database.

Reading Advance Queuing with XMLType payload and JDBC Driver character encoding

Hi
I've got a problem retrieving the message from the queue with XMLType payload in Java.
It was working fine in 10g database but after the switch to 11g it returns corrupted string instead of real XML message. Database NLS_LANG setting is AL32UTF8
It is said that JDBC driver should deal with that automatically but it obviously don't in this case. When I dequeue the message using database functionality (DBMS_AQ package) it looks fine but not when using JDBC driver so Ithink it is character encoding issue or so. The message itself is enqueued by the database and supposed to be retrieved by dedicated EJB.
Driver file used: ojdbc6.jar
Additional libraries: aqapi.jar, xdb.jar
All file taken from 11g database installation.
What shoul dI do to get the xml message correctly?

Do you mean NLS_LANG is AL32UTF8 or the database character set is AL32UTF8? What is the database character set (SELECT value FROM nls_database_parameters WHERE parameter='NLS_CHARACTERSET')?
Thanks,
Sergiusz

Importance of character encoding?

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