Re: [help-texinfo] how does one encode a middle dot? and other questions

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Benno Schulenberg <address@hidden>
> Cc: address@hidden
> Date: Mon, 06 Apr 2015 13:10:54 +0200
> 
> > > First, is there a way to encode U+00B7 (middle dot) in a texi
> > > file, in a way similar to @guillemetright{} and @bullet{}?
> > 
> > Not clear what you are asking.  A simple answer is just use that
> > character in the Texinfo source, [...]
> 
> Well, the actual UTF-8 characters is what we have in the .texi
> source file now.  But 'svn blame' complains that it is a binary
> file.  Of course I could use --force or do a propset, but I
> realized that I wish to have the source file in pure plain ASCII.
> 
> So I would like to write as ASCII things like @guillemetright{}
> and @bullet{} and @middledot{}, and have them come out as actual
> UTF-8 characters when makeinfo is run in a UTF-8 locale, and have
> them reduced to somehting vaguely similar in locale encodings that
> don't have that specific character in their character set.

Others have pointed out the @U feature in the next release.

> > The next release will have a feature in the stand-alone Info reader to
> > replace the characters that cannot be displayed by suitable ASCII art.
> 
> Does that mean that when the .info file contains an actual UTF-8
> character, say a right guillemet (U+00BB), and info is run in a plain
> POSIX locale, the character would be shown as >> or something?

Nitpicking: the Info file will contain a UTF-8 _sequence_ for the
U+00BB character.

> Hmm, testing it...  Yes, that appears to work.  Cool.
> 
> So I could use @documentencoding UTF-8 in some future, and rest
> assured that it won't result in garbage in other locales.

Please note that this treatment is reserved to certain Unicode
characters that the stand-alone reader knows about, not to any
arbitrary character out there.  Basically, the characters emitted by
makeinfo as part of formatting are the only ones supported.