ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22/Java SG

ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC22/Java SG   N 3-9

DATE: 1998-10-13

REPLACES: N/A

DOC TYPE: Plain DOS Text

TITLE: Mandatory Set of Coded Character Sets ' Converters

SOURCE: Japan (Yuki Mizutani)

PROJECT: N/A

STATUS: This document is circulated to National Bodies of JTC 1/SC22/Java SG
for review and consideration at the October 1998 SC22/Java SG meeting in Tokyo.

ACTION ID: FYI

DUE DATE:

DISTRIBUTION: P and L Members

MEDIUM:

DISKETTE NO.:

NO. OF PAGES: 1

Text of contribution:

ISO Java standard should specify 1) mandatory set of coded character sets'
converters, 2) behavior of the converters, required for implementation of
ISO Java standard to claim its conformity. The specifications are also required
for strictly conforming ISO Java standard application not to rely on an
implementation defined feature of the ISO Java standard, in order to ensure
the strictly conforming application can be executed correctly on any ISO Java
standard conforming implementation.

Back ground of the requirements are as follows:
The current implementation of JDK provided by SMI includes many coded character
sets' converters, such as ISO/IEC 8859-1, Shift JIS form of JIS X 0208, and
various IT vendors' unique encodings.  However, those converters are not
included in all Java environment provided by IT vendors.  For example, several
famous Web browsers does not include the character sets' converters between
DBCS EBCDIC and Unicode.

Due to lack of the character sets' converters by IT vendors, applications
cannot judge which character sets' converters are available, and can be used
for conversion to a particular vendor unique coded character set.