Japanese characters in TITLE element

[Erwin Moller]

Huh? That was written while in _good_ mood.

Seconded.
I met Jukka once on a *bad* day: even worse.

Thereby not giving any URL, browser name or version, and giving a wrong
accoung of what actually happened. I bet the squares weren't squares.
And the correct word "rectangles" would still be insufficient description.

Good point.
The problem with the clueless, like me, is that it is hard for them to
give the right information.
You could have queried for the information in a friendlier way, like
asking for the OS and browser and such, instead of calling me clueless.

We have no information on whether the problem occurred for the OP's own
page(s) only.

Before posting I tested a few Japanese sites, just like a few others did
in this thread, and I saw rectangles/squares too in the title.
But I didn't saw so in original posting.

I am very sorry I wasted your valuable time, Mr. Korpela.

<snip>

SOLVED.

To all others (Pascal, Neil, dorayme, cwdjxyz, Jonathan, and Stanimir):
Thank you very much!
It turned out that my OS (XP/SP3) couldn't display them until I
installed the "files for Eastern Asian languages", like Stanimir suggested.

I didn't realize the OS was responsible for displaying the title, and
rather naively expected the application (browser) to handle that. Hence
my confusion.

Thank you all again.
I have Japanese characters now in my title (as if I can read them).

Regards,
Erwin Moller

 

[Neil Gould]

Really? Are you sure it is the browser not the OS? Kanji in both
window title AND page content with not problem in Firefox 3.6.16 in
Ubuntu.

Well, it's some combination of both the OS and the app, I suspect.

 

[Jonathan N. Little]

Well, it's some combination of both the OS and the app, I suspect.

How do you come to that conclusion? If the browser had a part and it
failed in one OS then it should also fail in another...where the common
bit is the browser.

 

[Neil Gould]

How do you come to that conclusion? If the browser had a part and it
failed in one OS then it should also fail in another...where the
common bit is the browser.

I understand your reasoning, and mostly agree. However, the API for the two
OSs UI are not the same.

 

[Jonathan N. Little]

I understand your reasoning, and mostly agree. However, the API for the two
OSs UI are not the same.

Right, so if the window title is handled by the respective OS's API and
in one OS it fails then the problem is with the API, i.e, the OS and not
the browser...

 

[cwdjrxyz]

dorayme wrote:



At the moment, I have 8 browsers installed. Atwww.sony.com, all show
proper Japanese characters and a few English words. The OS is Windows
Vista 64-bit, and nearly all updates are installed. The recent
browsers are Firefox 3.6.16, IE9, Safari for Windows 5.0.4, Opera
11.01, Google Chrome 10.0.648.204, SeaMonkey 2.0.9, Flock 3.5.3.4641,
and K-meleon 1.5.4. I do not recall installing any extras on the OS or
the browsers that would modify or add support for Japanese, but it is
always possible that I missed reading something for an update that I
made. The mentioned Sony page looks nearly the same on all browsers
used - as close as you can expect for a variety of browsers.

I also have an older computer with Windows XP 32-bit OS and nearly all
updates installed. Again, for it I do not recall any updates or extras
installed on the XP OS or the browsers that would have anything to do
with Japanese characters. Browsers are IE7, Opera 10.10, and Firefox
3.5.9. I saw no problems with display of Japanese characters using the
mentioned browsers when viewing www.sony.jp .

 

[dorayme]

<[email protected]
m>,

....

....
I also have an older computer with Windows XP 32-bit OS and nearly all
updates installed. Again, for it I do not recall any updates or extras
installed on the XP OS or the browsers that would have anything to do
with Japanese characters. Browsers are IE7, Opera 10.10, and Firefox
3.5.9. I saw no problems with display of Japanese characters using the
mentioned browsers when viewing www.sony.jp .

The browsers play a part, the OSs play a part in delivering what
is seen. In Mac, as I understand, at least from when I used to be
interested in Mac resources on > X, there are all sorts of
standard window templates/resources that are utilised by
applications, this gives a standard/familiar look.

The text that is supposed to go in the title bar area at top of
browsers, where there is such, must be supplied either by the app
or, in the case of a web page, by the text in the title element
of the markup doc or by a co-operation of both latter. Surely the
OS does not look at HTML docs, it relies somehow on the info
being passed by the browser, which in turn takes info from the
HTML doc.

Given that all my modern browsers get it right, the co-operation
works well. In the case of MacIE5, it fails. This looks like
either a failure of the browser to do whatever it has to do to
pass on instructions or a failure of the OS to recognise what it
is being told.

Frankly, what I would be tempted to do with two scrapping boys in
the playground, unlike the fair Jonathan Little who would be sure
that one of them was at fault, is grab them both by the ears and
haul them into the classroom and make them write out lines (and
then insist they go pick up a number of lollypop sticks discarded
in the playground).

In this sleepy usenet group, let us not expect that anyone
actually knows what happens in some detail or who would bother
spending ten minutes explaining clearly what happens?

 

[Harlan Messinger]

Mon, 04 Apr 2011 13:27:51 +0200, /Erwin Moller/:


No, it doesn't mean the browser cannot display them (as you've already
pointed out you see them just fine in the page content). It means the OS
GUI can't display them in the window title given your current setup.
Various factors as font availability (fonts containing the necessary
characters) and font substitution may affect the observed results. If
you're on Windows XP, I guess you need to install the East Asian
language support files:

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/.../proddocs/en-us/int_pr_install_languages.mspx

Arriving at this late but for the sake of providing insight, on my
Windows 7 machine, when I go to www.sony.jp in Firefox 3.6.16, the
Japanese title text appears correctly in the tab but it's all question
marks in the browser window's caption bar. In IE 8, however, it appears
correctly in both places.

 

[Helpful person]

I would say the tab is part of the browser UI, since FF "gets is right"
then the tab has the kanji displayed, but the window title is part of
the OS's UI, and Windows "gets is wrong". That is why the title does
work in Linux. The clue that the window title is part of the OS's UI is
in Linux where the UI is much easier to customize than Windows a change
in windows manager the change is evident in the window title (and menu),
but not in the tabs...

Just a little information from a beginner. I have Japanese fonts on
my windows 7 computer as I often get documents from Japan. In both
Firefox and IE8 I get the Japanese characters shown correctly in the
title bar and the tabs.

Hope this information is useful.