users@servlet-spec.java.net

[servlet-spec users] Re: Easy UTF-8

From: Edward Burns <edward.burns_at_oracle.com>
Date: Wed, 23 Sep 2015 10:30:46 -0700

Hello Philippe, Yannick, Mark, and Stuart,

[...excellent, well constructed and readable discussion omitted...]

>>>>> On Sun, 13 Sep 2015 14:09:06 +0200, Philippe Marschall <kustos_at_gmx.net> said:

PM> So how do we proceed from there? So should I file a JIRA?

Well, you've already done the right first step: bring it to the users
list. You've already done the right second step: engage in constructive
discussion to elicit the extent of the story. Filing a JIRA is
probably the right next step. Sorry for the following pedantry, but to
maximize the chances of this getting into the spec, the normal practices
for good a JIRA apply.

* searching the JIRA for an existing issue (surely a technology as old as
  Servlet has had this issue raised before!)

  Issues 26, 112, 40, and 67 [1] all deal with UTF-8 but don't capture
  precisely the actual requested feature.

* Make sure you precisely articulate the requested feature. My quick
  perusal of the discussion indicates this is not yet 100% clear. Mark
  Thomas shows his experience as a veteran of Servlet EGs and open
  source with this attempt to precisely articulate the requested
  feature:

>>>>> On Mon, 31 Aug 2015 12:01:52 +0100, Mark Thomas <markt_at_apache.org> said:

MT> There are multiple things that you might want to change.

MT> 1. URI decoding
MT> You can't define this per web application since the URI needs to decoded
MT> before it is mapped to the web application. Therefore this has to be a
MT> container wide setting which means this pretty much has to use container
MT> specific configuration.
MT> What we could do is make UTF-8 rather than ISO-8859-1 the default.

MT> 2. Response bodies
MT> A web.xml setting could be used to change from the current ISO-8859-1
MT> default to a default of UTF-8.

MT> 3. Request bodies
MT> A web.xml setting (the same as 2?) could be used to change from the
MT> current ISO-8859-1 default to a default of UTF-8.

MT> Any changes in defaults would need to be reflected in the JSP specification.

And Philippe (formerly known as the OP) added

>>>>> On Sun, 06 Sep 2015 19:24:27 +0200, Philippe Marschall <kustos_at_gmx.net> said:

PM> 4. Make it clear from the spec what the default is so that implementors
PM> agree what the default is. Ideally cover this by the TCK.

But there was some disagreement on some of those points above. I
recommend using Mark and Philippe's 4 points as the starting point,
hashing out the differences that remain, and then filing a JIRA at [1].

Thanks so much for this valuable input.

Ed

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[1] https://java.net/jira/browse/SERVLET_SPEC/