Problem with uppercasing �

Question

Hi,
I've found the following problem:
When you run:
System.out.println(Character.toUpperCase('�'));
System.out.println("�".toUpperCase());
System.out.println("�UN".toUpperCase());
System.out.println("Help Plea�e".toUpperCase());
with sdk 1.3 you get:
�
�
�UN
HELP PLEASSE
with sdk 1.4.1 you get:
�
SS
SSUN
HELP PLEASSE
Independently from wich sdk flavor you like the best , the semantics of this whole thing sounds rahter strange to me:
A string, converted to uppercase can have more characters than it originally had.
so for example y load a field my DB,I upercase it and when I update it might no longer fit because it might have even doblued it's size in the uppercasing.
Makind a geep analysys fo my problem, and with some help, I endded in this URL
http://german.about.com/library/anfang/blanfang_abc.htm
German for begginers:
There it reads:
� :
Lower case only. Replaces "ss" in some words. Not used in Swiss German.
gro� (big, great), die Stra�e (street)
BUT: das Wasser (water), dass (that), muss (must)
I don�t understand why:
If the letter has no uppercase does java try to invent that SS.
Furthermore, it is clear that:
Letter � could replace "ss" in some words but
who said that ss could replace � ????
Guys at sun:
a -> b does not imply
b -> a
I would be grateful if you could help me to understand what is going on with this.
Thank you very much
Santiago P�rez Ghiglia
[email protected]

Answer 1

JoachimSauer:
Thank you so much for your answer, it was really clear.
I would really fancy a 'SS' character. Although I can understand that upercasing a string could have a different meaning than uppercasing it's characters individually, because in a string the characters are in a context and whatsoever... I don't still like the idea of the growing on uppercase Strings. Just imagine what would you do if you wanted to unicode like Upercase a string in C, the string (char array) would take up more space so you could be forced to move the your string elsewhere (in memory) so that you cculd make it fit.
Anyway, your answer was of great help. I�ll probably start learning German.
Santiago
PD=So it's the "guys at Unicode" 's door the one I have to knock, =)