Posting with Chinese Characters

[Ah Gin]

Hi folks,

Need a bit of advice. I noticed that whenever I post a message with an embedded Chinese character, it seems not to display correctly by the time it's posted on the MB. When viewing I have tried the usual, ie,(I am using Microsoft IE 7), View/encoding/ etc. But the result is not much different. Any suggestions?

Regards, Ah Gin

[Henry]

Ah Gin

Whenever I see some scrambled characters instead of Chinese characters - I go to the top of the browser page, click on "View", then "Character Encoding" usually, then I click on the following three encodings until I hit the correct one - "Unicode", then "Chinese Traditional" and then "Chinese Simplified". Generally, when there are no more scrambled characters on the character string of interest - then, you have hit the correct encoding.

I believe these three encodings will cover the various encodings that are usually transmitted when you send some Chinese characters strings in your email - I think each email server may be set to encode Chinese characters in your email differently. I would have to play around with my server to figure out how to send Chinese characters in a particular encoding. I hope this makes sense.

Henry

[Ah Gin]

Henry,

Many thanks. Seems to work this time, when I went View, Character Encoding, Chinese Simplified. Other Chinese encoding seems to give me gibblish. I am using XP.

Regards, Ah Gin

[Henry]

Ah Gin,

Trying the 4 encodings of "Unicode", "Chinese Traditional" and two "Simplified Chinese" usually allows for the correct display of Chinese characters on most email messages and the Forum. You keep selecting a different encoding until all the gibberish in the Chinese character string of interest is gone and you finally display all the Chinese characters properly.

I used a "FireFox" browser and "Thunderbird" email client to send my emails and checked on the selection of a particular encoding of the Chinese characters that I can select to send out in my email messages.

In my particular browser/email client configuration - which I believe is fairly common - after you paste in your Chinese characters into the email message - go to "Options", click on "Character Encoding" and select the encoding you want for your Chinese characters. These are:

Unicode (UTF-8)
Chinese Traditional (Big5)
Chinese Simplified (GB 2312)
Chinese Simplified (GB 18030)

The Unicode standard is used for every language in the world and is the most comprehensive. The Traditional & 2 Simplified Chinese standards are only national standards within China.

As you know the encoding that you have selected to encode your Chinese characters - you can advise the recipient of your message which encoding they need to select to view your Chinese characters. But, it choosing one of the 4 encodings usually gets the correct encoding.

Henry

[Ah Gin]

Many thanks Henry. I have mostly tried using UTF, but sometimes in haste, I forget to check before I hit the "Send" or "Post" button. Ah well, this old brain will have to slow down a bit. Years ago, I had a humerous end result. I send a document to a friend who is not entirely expert in things IT or reading Chinese characters. He proceeded to make a rubber stamp, using what he thought were the Chinese characters, because it looked Chinese. Needless to say, the rubber stamp is now my source of laughter, not at him, but us non IT guys.

PS: I use Microsoft's IE, only because I dare not upset my computer, nor Uncle Bill.

Regards, Ah Gin