Re: why we must get rid of unicode.semantics switch ASAP

On Jan 21, 2008, at 7:14 PM, Andi Gutmans wrote:

I see I may not have been clear in my previous email. Indeed as Stas mentioned I agree we should not have a php.ini switch, i.e. unicode.semantics goes away. At the same time I propose: a) We invest considerable energy in figuring out and documenting the migration path. b) We build automated migration scripts when possible (like we did in PHP/FI 2 -> PHP 3 ) to make the migration easier. c) We keep an open mind regarding some areas which could make it easier to adopt especially when the net benefits only affect a smaller audience or audiences which already today are used to working harder with various languages (e.g. fgets() returning IS_STRING by default, "foo" produces IS_STRING, and u"foo" produces IS_UNICODE, ...). These are just examples and I think reality will depend on (a).

a) - Absolutely b) - Absolutely c) - I really, really, really, really x 100 do not believe that binary strings should be the default and that Unicode strings need explicit syntax. I've written about this many times before, so I won't reiterate, but please let's be progressive in this area. Even Python is moving towards Unicode strings being the default. -Andrei