Question:
What is Unicode? I want to change something?
lala G
2009-11-21 07:02:14 UTC
I want to change the language for non-unicode programs but I have no idea what is a unicode. And I'm afraid of what will happen if I change . What programs will be affected????
Three answers:
Jallan
2009-11-23 08:54:02 UTC
Almost every computer system sold in the last ten years supports Unicode, which is essentially just one single large character set that supports most characters used in all languages, and will in time, in theory, support every character used in any language.



See the offcial website of the Unicode Consortium at http://unicode.org/ for full information.



Non-Unicode programs are those that do not (yet) support Unicode. They instead use the smaller 8-bit character set which was the default character set in earlier versions of your operating system.



Changing to a different language within an application should normally only affect that single application. If you change to another language not supported by the current old-style character set, this may change your keyboard. Or if you are changing to a language that uses a completely different character set, that may change more.



Most operating systems, when you make such a change, provide a way of quickly changing back so that, for example, you can use Arabic and English on the same machine, switching between one and the other.



Without knowing exactly what operating system you are using and what version of the operating system, and what exactly you are trying to do, I can’t be more specific. But normally changing your system to handle another language for non-Unicode applications should not cause any problems, unless the application cannot handle that language. For example, not every older Word Processor can handle Arabic.



Normally, if your change does not prove satisfactory to you, you can always change back with no problems.



By the way, you can normally change your keyboard driver to use the keyboard for a different language. This will affect all programs, whether Unicode or non-Unicode. You can also change the default 8-bit character set. That will only affect non-Unicode programs. But it will affect all of them.
Eagle
2009-11-21 07:17:53 UTC
The Unicode Consortium enables people around the world to use computers in any language. Our members develop the Unicode Standard, Unicode Locales (CLDR), and other standards. These specifications form the foundation for software internationalization in all major operating systems, search engines, applications, and the Web.



"Unicode is a vital part of the effort to make computing global." — Rob Pike (more)
anonymous
2016-05-25 03:19:01 UTC
Did you open the file in Word? Because Word will complain if the file is corrupted. If you opened the file in a text editor, that's what it'll look like. (You can't edit Word files in a text editor.) You can save a Word file as text file from within word, but you'll lose the images. Also, in case you thought you could convert a file by changing the extension from .doc to .txt: you can't.


This content was originally posted on Y! Answers, a Q&A website that shut down in 2021.
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