Name: boT120536 Date: 03/14/2001


java version "1.3.1-beta"
Java(TM) 2 Runtime Environment, Standard Edition (build 1.3.1-beta-b15)
Java HotSpot(TM) Client VM (build 1.3.1beta-b15, mixed mode)

No, its not the operating system character set, and no its not fixed in the
1.3.1 beta. It is however, broken in java 1.3 on Solaris.
This little program:

public class DifferentAnswers {
    public static final char rs = 0xc8;
    public static void main(String argv[]) {
        System.out.println("a" + rs);
    }
}

When run on a solaris 8 machine, running Java 1.2.X and redirected to a file
will create a file, with an a, and an E with an accent, ("a?"). This is what it
should do. On that very same Solaris machine, Java 1.3 and Java 1.3.1 will
produce a file with an a and a question mark. Every character in the extended
ascii set gets converted to a question mark.
If you build a web system, that accepts input from users, extended ascii, will
be in your input stream. Web pages like this one for example....
Or all of our JSP pages....

If I write a jsp running under JRUN on a solaris 8 machine, that writes a
web page that a user sees that includes extended ascii characters and it
works while running Java 1.2.X, then I upgrade to java 1.3 or 1.3.1beta,
and it starts spewing out question marks instead of the extended ascii
characters it cannot be the machine, the font, the character set or
anything other than the java implementation.

I posted this as a bug, and got a reply that it was fixed in the next
release. I downloaded 1.3.1 beta (the next release) and it is not fixed. I
posted again, and got a bunch of junk about operating system character
sets. I did not change operating systems or character sets, I just changed
versions of jdk.

In any case, if I look at the output stream and I do not see bytes with
values above 127, and instead I see the question mark, I know something is
very wrong. This is not a display issue, it is a morphing oir masking issue.


(Review ID: 118757)
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