GNU bug report logs - #28705
25.3; [PATCH] Change prefered coding system for Japanese language environment

Previous Next

To reply to this bug, email your comments to 28705 AT debbugs.gnu.org.

Toggle the display of automated, internal messages from the tracker.

Message #5 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Yasuhiro KIMURA <yasu <at> utahime.org>
To: bug-gnu-emacs <at> gnu.org
Subject: 25.3; [PATCH] Change prefered coding system for Japanese
 language environment
Date: Wed, 04 Oct 2017 20:02:54 +0900 (JST)

[Message part 1 (text/plain, inline)]

In current implementation, 'japanese-iso-8bit' is used as prefered
coding system when you select 'Japanese' as language environment on
Unix system. But nowaday a lot of Japanese Unix users adopt
'ja_JP.UTF-8' as locale setting. So I propose to change prefered
coding system from 'japanese-iso-8bit' to 'utf-8'. And while I'm on
it, comment is fixed to fit current implementation.

[0001-Change-prefered-coding-system-for-Japanese-language-.patch (text/x-patch, inline)]

From 2c80312989659375f82d7eefd333e5ac77663f4b Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Yasuhiro KIMURA <yasu <at> utahime.org>
Date: Wed, 4 Oct 2017 19:09:21 +0900
Subject: [PATCH] Change prefered coding system for Japanese language
 environment.

* lisp/language/japan-util.el (setup-japanese-environment-internal):
  Use utf-8 as prefered coding system instead of japanese-iso-8bit
  when system is not windows. And while I'm at it, fix comment to fit
  current implementation.
---
 lisp/language/japan-util.el | 4 ++--
 1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/lisp/language/japan-util.el b/lisp/language/japan-util.el
index 988b925409..fb4b408cd3 100644
--- a/lisp/language/japan-util.el
+++ b/lisp/language/japan-util.el
@@ -29,11 +29,11 @@
 
 ;;;###autoload
 (defun setup-japanese-environment-internal ()
-  ;; By default, we use 'japanese-iso-8bit for file names.  But, the
+  ;; By default, we use 'iso-2022-jp for default coding system.  But, the
   ;; following prefer-coding-system will override it.
   (if (memq system-type '(windows-nt ms-dos cygwin))
       (prefer-coding-system 'japanese-shift-jis)
-    (prefer-coding-system 'japanese-iso-8bit))
+    (prefer-coding-system 'utf-8))
   (use-cjk-char-width-table 'ja_JP))
 
 (defconst japanese-kana-table
-- 
2.14.2

Message #8 received at 28705 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Paul Eggert <eggert <at> cs.ucla.edu>
To: Yasuhiro KIMURA <yasu <at> utahime.org>
Cc: 28705 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: 25.3; [PATCH] Change prefered coding system for Japanese language
 environment
Date: Fri, 6 Oct 2017 14:10:29 -0700

[Message part 1 (text/plain, inline)]

Thanks for the bug report. Would you please discuss the practical 
advantages of the proposed patch?

Is the patch is for Japanese users who do not specify a locale via 
environment variables like LC_ALL? If so, how do they specify their 
preference to Emacs now, and how would this change affect behavior for 
them? And how do users specify their coding preference to other 
programs, such as "cat" and "diff"?

I have the impression that Emacs users in Japan are gradually switching 
from EUC-JP to UTF-8. Is there some way to verify this? I know of 
website surveys like 
<https://w3techs.com/technologies/history_overview/character_encoding/ms/y>, 
which says that since 2010 UTF-8 has grown from 51% to 90% of websites 
whereas EUC-JP has shrunk from 0.7% to 0.3% worldwide. However, this 
issue is more about what encodings are used by keyboards and terminal 
displays in Japan (typically these are programs in windowing systems 
these days, as GNU/Linux consoles cannot handle enough characters to 
support Japanese). Is there some way to estimate this?

A minor point: a change like this should be noted in the NEWS file, and 
the commit message should use the usual Emacs style. I'm attaching a 
copy of your patch with a revised commit message, along with another 
patch to mention this change in NEWS and to change affected 
documentation. I will ask for comment about this proposed change on the 
emacs-devel mailing list.

[0001-Change-preferred-Japanese-coding-system-to-UTF-8.patch (text/x-patch, attachment)]

[0002-Mention-Japanese-change-in-documentation.patch (text/x-patch, attachment)]

Previous Next

GNU bug tracking system
Copyright (C) 1999 Darren O. Benham, 1997,2003 nCipher Corporation Ltd, 1994-97 Ian Jackson.