Re: Suggested character set policy for the IETF

[Chris Newman <Chris.Newman@INNOSOFT.COM>]

On Fri, 27 Jun 1997, Martin J. Duerst wrote:
> The first part of your definition, "mapping from octets to characters",
> is very widely known and used. The second part of the definition, "related
> presentation information", is new to me. Is this your own definition,
> or where did you find it? What exactly does the term "presetation
> information" mean for you? How do you assure that it means the same
> thing for others?

The "related presentation information" is a missing portion of the
definition.  There are things like CRLF, character directionality, Unicode
joiner/no-joiners, etc. which effect presentation but are not "characters"
in the traditional sense.

> I agree that a definition in terms of "overall effect" is shorter
> and better suited to the level of Harald's document, and that
> the reader can be referred to RFC 2130 for the decomposing
> definition and the other details. But "related presentation
> information" hasn't been part of the definition up to now,
> and is extremely ambiguous.

Suggestions for making it more precise would be helpful.  It'd be nice to
get this right in the next revision of the MIME specification.