[Python-3000] Help on text editors

[Jeff Wilcox]

> From: "Paul Prescod" <paul at prescod.net>
> 1. On US English Windows, Notepad defaults to an encoding called "ANSI".
> "ANSI" is not a real encoding at all (and certainly not one from the
On Japanese Windows 2000, Notepad defaults to ANSI as it does in the English
version.  It actually writes Shift JIS though.

> 2. On my English Mac, the default character set for textedit is "Mac OS
> Roman". What is it for foreign language macs? What API does an application
> use to query this default character set? What setting is it derived from?
> The Unix-level locale (seems not!) or some GUI-level setting (which one)?

Mac OS X actually doesn't have different language versions of the operating
system.  If you change the language setting, the Japanese version *becomes*
the English version and vice versa. (Several of the English speakers that I
work with have purchased Japanese Macs and switched them over to English,
they're indistinguishable from English Macs afterwards.  Similarly, several
Macs purchased in the US have been successfully switched to Japanese, and
become indistinguishable from Macs bought in Japan.)

> 3. In general, how do modern versions of Linux and other Unix handle this
> issue? In particular: what is your default encoding and how did your

On Vine Linux (popular in Japan), the default text encoding is EUC with no
configuration changes.