Bug #61354 [Com]: htmlentities and htmlspecialchars doesn't respect the default_charset

From: Date: Sun, 27 Jan 2013 17:32:18 +0000
Subject: Bug #61354 [Com]: htmlentities and htmlspecialchars doesn't respect the default_charset
References: 1  Groups: php.bugs 
Request: Send a blank email to php-bugs+get-176279@lists.php.net to get a copy of this message 
Edit report at https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=61354&edit=1

 ID:                 61354
 Comment by:         kstirn at gmail dot com
 Reported by:        hufeng1987 at gmail dot com
 Summary:            htmlentities and htmlspecialchars doesn't respect
                     the default_charset
 Status:             Not a bug
 Type:               Bug
 Package:            Strings related
 Operating System:   Linux/Windows/
 PHP Version:        5.4.0
 Block user comment: N
 Private report:     N

 New Comment:

It will soon be a year since the release of PHP 5.4 and there still is no easy way (read: a global
PHP setting) to overcome this huge backwards-incompatibility. 

PHP developers, I understand the security concerns, but please don't be so stubborn and give us
an option to set a default setting without having to modify *all* legacy code to work with 5.4.

Your action (or lack thereof) is producing the opposite results of desired - instead of moving to
PHP 5.4, thousands of servers (including several we own) will stay with 5.3.x even after end of life
cycle in March 2013.

*Fact*
A simple global setting (an optional php.ini value) would solve the issue for thousands of users
while addressing security issues by explicitly defining the default charset to be used by affected
functions - all without having to rewrite existing code.

PHP team please do reconsider this and help everyone not using UTF-8 move to PHP 5.4.

Thank you!


Previous Comments:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[2013-01-05 17:39:04] x dot bazilio at gmail dot com

Ok. If i did not set defautlt time zone, i get E_WARNING.
Let us set default encoding for htmlspecialchars. It is not posible to persuade 
developers of Drupal, joomla, wordpress, bitrix, ets., and developers of modules 
for that CMS to rewrite their code.
I wrote to tech support of bitrix (russian cms). They said that i must use PHP 
5.3.x. They not going to rewrite code.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[2013-01-05 16:05:31] leaflet at leafok dot com

I understand your consideration. Maybe a global configuration in PHP.ini or page 
lifecycle set function could be provided for encoding setting of these functions. 
Developers would be glad to handle this setting centrally by a include header file 
for each pages.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[2013-01-05 15:17:56] rasmus@php.net

I have explained that a few times. We can't default it automatically because the  
encoding may not match the output encoding. Only the developer knows that. If we 
did that automatically it would break even more sites. The sites where the 
encodings differ need to set it explicitly.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[2013-01-05 09:54:44] hufeng1987 at gmail dot com

pass null and empty string that could improve security? no sense..

------------------------------------------------------------------------
[2013-01-05 09:53:01] x dot bazilio at gmail dot com

Please, fix it.
It is so simple to provide default params. Wy should we put NULL and empty 
string? Where is security problem to not put NULL and empty string if they are 
will be default values of that params?

------------------------------------------------------------------------


The remainder of the comments for this report are too long. To view
the rest of the comments, please view the bug report online at

    https://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=61354


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