Handling chinese characters in Frontpage 2000

[Guest]

Hi.

I've been sent some HTML files containing chinese texts, with encodings
"big5" (traditional chinese) and "gb2312" (simplified chinese).

I'm using Office 2K SR-1, running on Windows Server 2003.

When I open one of these files with Frontpage 2000, modify some text, and
save the file with a different name, the resulting file contains some "extra
code" (SPAN tags, for example) which were not there in the original file.

Anybody knows of a way in which I can prevent Frontpage from doing that ?

Any suggestion on what software would be the best choise to handle pages
containing such kind of characters ?

Thanks a lot in advance.

 

[Wally S]

The difference between Big5 and GB is not traditional vs simplified, because
both can be written with either Big5 or GB. It's just a question of
switching fonts. In computer language, a Chinese character consists of two
high-bit ascii characters together. Which ascii characters combine to form
which Chinese characters is called the coding, and this is the difference
between Big5 and GB.

GB is used in Mainland China, where simplified characters are the norm, and
this is why people say that GB is for simplified. Big5 is used in Hong Kong
and Taiwan, where traditional is the norm. Office 2000 (and above, I assume)
comes with the ability to handle both Chinese codings. You just have to
install it. And there are software packages for writing Chinese with English
Windows. English FP will handle Chinese with no problem, but you would be
better off doing the original writing with a specialized software.

You get the <span> tags because Chinese is not the default language in your
FP. I don't know what to do about them, but someone else on the conference
may be able to help you. On the other hand, if there are not so many that
they get in your way, why not just leave them?

I have played with Chinese on my English FP, but I have never used it on a
website, so I can't give you any practical advice except this: If you put
Chinese on a web page, the reader will need to have Chinese installed in his
computer. Otherwise the Chinese will be displayed as a row of question marks
or gibberish.

Wally S