[I18n-sig] Codecs for Big Five and GB 2312

[Tamito KAJIYAMA]

* Martin v. Loewis
| 
| Installing into python2.0/encodings/{euc_jp,shift_jis,japanese}
| doesn't look right to me - add-on packages should be capable of
| installing into site-packages by default.

* M.-A. Lemburg
| 
| The "right" way to install new codec packages is by placing them
| inside a package which then registers a new search function in the
| codec registry.
| 
| Tamito's other does this AFAIR.
| 
| To be able to use the codecs, a Python script must then import
| the codecs package (which then registers the search function).

Beta versions of the Japanese codecs have been implemented as a
usual add-on package, so applications need to import it before
using a Japanese codec.  I had provided a module named codecs_ja
which registers codecs for EUC-JP and Shift_JIS at a time.

The current version of the codecs has been implemented as a
special "codecs" package that needs to be installed into
lib/encodings as well as the standard encodings.

I think we need an agreement on how non-standard codecs should
be installed.

I prefer the later approach.  I want Python to take care of all
encoding issues, and if possible I want to write applications
without considering which encodings can be handled at the core
language level.  I hope that in the near future Python will
support all encodings that have mappings from/to Unicode.  If an
application requires an encoding that is not supported by Python
at that time, then a LookupError raises; all the application
needs to do is to catch that exception and to tell the user that
the encoding is currently not supported.  I think this is not a
problem, since it is automatically solved without any changes to
the application once Python supports that encoding.

Regards,

-- 
KAJIYAMA, Tamito <kajiyama@grad.sccs.chukyo-u.ac.jp>