Mark Davis <mark dot davis at jtcsv dot com> wrote: > Little probability that right double quote would appear at the start > of a document either. Doesn't mean that you are free to delete it > (*and* say that you are not modifying the contents).
True, but right double quote: (a) has a visible glyph with a well-defined human-readable meaning, (b) isn't defined by Unicode as having a text-processing influence on adjoining characters (leaving the question wide open of what to do when there are fewer than two adjoining characters), (c) doesn't have a second meaning as a signature that under certain conditions can be stripped. > I agree that when the UTC decides that a BOM is *only* to be used as a > signature, and that it would be ok to delete it anywhere in a document > (like a non-character), then we are in much better shape. This was, as > a matter of fact proposed for 3.2, but not approved. If we did that > for 4.0, then there would be much less reason to distinguish UTF-8 > 'withBOM' from UTF-8 'withoutBOM'. Every one of us will be grateful when that day comes. -Doug Ewell Fullerton, California
