Subj : Re: UTF vs specific
To   : Karel Kral
From : Eugene Subbotin
Date : Sat Sep 19 2026 09:35 am

Hello Karel!

Saturday September 19 2026 08:29, you wrote to me:

 ES>> CP895 messages then read correctly and what you write goes out as
 ES>> CP852 with a proper CHRS kludge. Writing CP895 from a UTF-8
 ES>> session is not possible with a table now (I'll add
 ES>> reverse-encoding later): a CHS

 KK> Then I will wait for it. I thought conversion between 1 byte and "more
 KK> than one byte" encoding is that big move in new Golded+ approach.

Reverse encoding was added in the latest release

 ES>> If an area REALLY has to stay CP895, run an 8-bit session
 ES>> instead:

 KK> As I have now. In regio42 areas I can use encoding. In International
 KK> keep 7bit virtual ASCII. And forget about UTF8.

 ES>> But PLEASE do not post CP895 messages to Fidonet!

 KK> This I can not agree. It is about moderators of each echomail
 KK> conference and its rules. For r42 is only alowed CP895 (since ever). I
 KK> did some investigation since my rc42 and will not change.

 ES>> Neither the Fidonet standard FTS-5003 nor IANA recognizes this

 KK> Checking that FTS - 7.4.2012 - far after CodePage was stabilized in
 KK> r42. FTS should not be accepted in that shape, that time.

But it does.

 ES>> encoding. Nobody else has a table for it - iconv, Windows and
 ES>> OS/2 do not know the charset - so every other reader, GoldED+
 ES>> without tables included, shows a CP895 message as rubbish,
 ES>> exactly what you saw.

 KK> I am using that code page since ever (in fidonet). See proper and use
 KK> characters. I wondered if new Golded+ can help me to live with OS in
 KK> UTF - which can not so far.

 KK> What must be done: 1) add CP895 into iconv and 2) get Golded+ working
 KK> with 1byte against UTF and back conversion

No one will ever add this encoding to iconv or the Windows distribution: itīs 
used too rarely.
Reversible encoding should work, so this encoding can be used with a conversion 
table.

 KK> It reminded me situation I was supporting big International (ok,
 KK> German) company starting to sell ecom in .cz They simply refused czech
 KK> coding, using pure English... Until Czech Post (they contracted)
 KK> simply refused to deliver ;-) We can say that CP895 is not alllowed in
 KK> Fidonet since 2012 - but is used in r42 since ever and until now - on
 KK> all (active) Nodes and Points.

It's clear. Why didnīt they switch to the standardized CP850?

Eugene

.... It's full of stars!
--- GoldED+/BSD 2.0.0-b20260912 (NetBSD 11.0 Intel Xeon Icelake)
 * Origin: FireFox Station (2:5075/35)

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