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Posted to users@httpd.apache.org by NLR REDDY <nl...@live.com> on 2011/02/04 06:48:39 UTC

[users@httpd] URI with European characters‏




Hi,

We are implementing a German language website but our servers
 are located in USA. We have created files and folders for the site in 
german characters (like schließen.html). Now, the problem is apache is 
unable to decode when the user clicks a link which has uri with german 
characters. I see 404 status message even though I can see the file in 
the folder. Can anyone help me resolve the issue.

version of apache being used: 2.0.52.

Thanks 		 	   		  

Re: [users@httpd] URI with European characters‏

Posted by Martin Kuba <ma...@ics.muni.cz>.
Dne 4.2.2011 06:48, NLR REDDY napsal(a):
> Hi,
>
> We are implementing a German language website but our servers are located in USA. We have created files and folders for the site in german characters (like schließen.html). Now, the problem is apache
> is unable to decode when the user clicks a link which has uri with german characters. I see 404 status message even though I can see the file in the folder. Can anyone help me resolve the issue.
>
> version of apache being used: 2.0.52.

Hi,

do not use non-ASCII characters in URLs. I repeat DO NOT USE NON-ASCII CHARACTERS IN URLS :-)

The problem is that RFCs defining URLs and later URIs are not defining
which encoding is used for non-ASCII characters. The first RFCs for URLs
were silent about encoding, later RFCs for HTML suggested iso-8859-1,
and later RFCs for URIs recommended UTF-8. But there is no way
how to specify which encoding is really used in URL.

So the only safe way is to use ASCII characters only. You can express
non-ASCII characters using ASCII by writing them as %XX where
XX are hexadecimal digits, however in such way you express *bytes*,
not *characters*, and that's big difference for non-ASCII characters.

Even if you painfully ensure that all your URLs are in UTF-8 encoded
in %XX and no buggy MSIE browser breaks them, there still may be
problems when translating URLs to filesystem names.

I know what I am talking about, my native language is Czech which uses
a lot of non-ASCII characters, and I have experience with Czech websites
for the last fourteen years.

Cheers

Martin
-- 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Supercomputing Center Brno             Martin Kuba
Institute of Computer Science    email: makub@ics.muni.cz
Masaryk University             http://www.ics.muni.cz/~makub/
Botanicka 68a, 60200 Brno, CZ     mobil: +420-603-533775
--------------------------------------------------------------


RE: [users@httpd] URI with European characters‏

Posted by NLR REDDY <nl...@live.com>.
Hi Igor,

Please see my answers below

> What's your filesystem's locale?
en_US.UTF-8

> What's the locale you're starting httpd with?
en_US.UTF-8

> What's your DefaultCharset?
UTF-8

Thanks


> Date: Fri, 4 Feb 2011 07:55:58 +0000
> From: i.galic@brainsware.org
> To: users@httpd.apache.org
> Subject: Re: [users@httpd] URI with European characters‏
> 
> 
> ----- "NLR REDDY" <nl...@live.com> wrote:
> 
> > Hi,
> > 
> > We are implementing a German language website but our servers are
> > located in USA. We have created files and folders for the site in
> > german characters (like schließen.html). Now, the problem is apache is
> 
> What's your filesystem's locale?
> What's the locale you're starting httpd with?
> 
> 
> > unable to decode when the user clicks a link which has uri with german
> > characters. I see 404 status message even though I can see the file in
> > the folder. Can anyone help me resolve the issue.
> 
> What's your DefaultCharset?
> http://httpd.apache.org/docs/current/mod/core.html#adddefaultcharset
> 
> > version of apache being used: 2.0.52.
> 
> That release is, at a rough estimate, 734 years old, but we'll assume
> it's not at fault for this issue.
> 
> > Thanks
> 
> i
> 
> -- 
> Igor Galić
> 
> Tel: +43 (0) 664 886 22 883
> Mail: i.galic@brainsware.org
> URL: http://brainsware.org/
> 
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Re: [users@httpd] URI with European characters‏

Posted by Igor Galić <i....@brainsware.org>.
----- "NLR REDDY" <nl...@live.com> wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> We are implementing a German language website but our servers are
> located in USA. We have created files and folders for the site in
> german characters (like schließen.html). Now, the problem is apache is

What's your filesystem's locale?
What's the locale you're starting httpd with?


> unable to decode when the user clicks a link which has uri with german
> characters. I see 404 status message even though I can see the file in
> the folder. Can anyone help me resolve the issue.

What's your DefaultCharset?
http://httpd.apache.org/docs/current/mod/core.html#adddefaultcharset

> version of apache being used: 2.0.52.

That release is, at a rough estimate, 734 years old, but we'll assume
it's not at fault for this issue.

> Thanks

i

-- 
Igor Galić

Tel: +43 (0) 664 886 22 883
Mail: i.galic@brainsware.org
URL: http://brainsware.org/

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