Re: [relax-ng] Encoding declaration, MIME type

["MURATA Makoto (FAMILY Given)" <EB2M-MRT@asahi-net.or.jp>]

> I certainly agree that we should use the media type when one is provided, 
> but what about something like a "file:" or "ftp:" URL, where there is no 
> media type?

Some people believe that existing OSs should be revised so that they can provide 
the charset parameter.  Gavin Nicol said that he wrote an I-D for this purpose 
long time ago.  I have recently learned that an old OS from IBM does associate 
every file with character encoding information.

> Here's a strawman proposal:
> 
> 1. If you get the RNC as a MIME entity including information about the 
> charset, then use that charset.  Note that text/plain without a charset 
> parameter is equivalent to "text/plain; charset=us-ascii".

I am happy with this.  By the way, if we stick to the HTTP RFC, the default 
is ISO-8859-1.  I certainly think that this default is ridiculous.

> 2. Otherwise, the RNC is in UTF-8 or UTF-16.  If it has a UTF-16 BOM, it's 
> UTF-16.  Otherwise it's UTF-8.

I can live with this.  By the way, which UTF-8?  With or without the Unicode 
signature?  Or, both?  (Probably, both/)

> 3. A system may provide a way to allow a user to specify an alternative 
> encoding for local files.

Again, I can live with this.

> 4. After converting the sequence of bytes to a sequence of characters, any 
> initial BOM is discarded.

Including the Unicode signature for UTF-8?  Probably, yes.

Non-ascii users will probably say that we should provide some in-band 
encoding declarations.  But I'm reluctant to do so.

If we need a specialized media type for our compact syntax, I think that 
application/vnd.oasis-open.rng with the charset parameter is probably 
acceptable.

Cheers,

Makoto