Re: [Json] Encoding detection (Was: Re: JSON: remove gap between Ecma-404 and IETF draft)

[John Cowan <[e-mail]>]

Henri Sivonen scripsit:

> What sensible reasons could there possibly be?

The fact that you (or even I) can't think of them doesn't mean they
don't exist.  There would be no sensible reason for me to write to you in
Finnish: your command of written English is near-native, and my command
of Finnish is zero.  But it would be absurd of me to say that people
should not communicate in Finnish because it harms interoperability.
It so happens that I know that there are five million people cheerfully
writing to each other in Finnish, under the impression that it is allowed.
But even if I didn't happen to know that, the point would be the same.

Now Finnish is a natural language, and JSON is not: it exists only by
virtue of its definition.  But that definition explains how to communicate
in JSON, and anyone who adheres to it is communicating correctly.  For us
to chop their feet out from under them by saying that what they are doing
does not count as JSON would be just as arbitrary as banning Finnish
because almost nobody speaks it.  We can say that we think it's a bad idea
to use non-UTF-8 encodings in JSON, and that's as far as we can justly go.

-- 
John Cowan                                <[e-mail]>
Yakka foob mog.  Grug pubbawup zink wattoom gazork.  Chumble spuzz.
    --Calvin, giving Newton's First Law "in his own words"