Re: [boost] [general] What will string handling in C++ look like in the future [was Always treat ... ]

Subject: Re: [boost] [general] What will string handling in C++ look like in the future [was Always treat ... ]
From: Edward Diener (eldiener_at_[hidden])
Date: 2011-01-19 09:58:13

On 1/19/2011 9:08 AM, Matus Chochlik wrote:
> On Wed, Jan 19, 2011 at 2:39 PM, Chad Nelson
> <chad.thecomfychair_at_[hidden]>  wrote:
>> On Wed, 19 Jan 2011 11:33:02 +0100
>> Matus Chochlik<chochlik_at_[hidden]>  wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> *Scenario A:*
>>
>> Sounds like a little slice of heaven to me. Though you'll still have
>> the pesky problem of having to verify that the UTF-8 code is valid all
>> the time. More on that below.
>
> I am a believer ;) and when people realize that UTF-8 is the way to
> go, the pesky problems will vanish. Believe me today with ANSI

I do not believe that UTF-8 is the way to go. In fact I know it is not, 
except perhaps for the very near future for some programmers ( Linux 
advocates ).

Inevitably a Unicode standard will be adapted where every character of 
every language will be represented by a single fixed length number of 
bits. Nobody will care any longer that this fixed length set of bits 
"wastes space", as so many people today hysterically are fixated on. 
Whether or not UTF-32 can do this now or not I do not know but this 
world where a character in some language on earth is represented by some 
arcane multi-byte encoding will end. If UTF-32 can not do it then UTF-nn 
inevitably will.

I do not think that shoving UTF-8 down everybody's throats is the best 
solution even now, I think a good set of classes to convert between 
encoding standards is much better.