Changing the default encoding type in Pocket Internet Explorer 4.01 or higher

Applies To:

• Handheld PC 2000

Overview:

This article discusses how to alter the default browser document encoding (the Code Page) under Pocket Internet Explorer 4.01 and higher.

More Info:

With the multiple and diverse numbers of languages and alphabet that exist on the Internet today, computers need to be able to represent the correct character onto the screen of any web browser and in any language. The most obvious step in this is a requirement for there to be a compatible font on the computer allowing the web browser to access and draw the correct character to the screen. In the computer the font is one of the last steps involved, behind this front end exists a literal map of character IDs (codes) and the subsequent character that is to be output (this in turn is linked to the applicable character referenced in the font file).

This map of characters is called the CodePage (Character Map being the Mac term). In general the CodePage is an 8-bit (1 byte) table, restricting the number of mapable characters to an upper limit of 256. The CodePage contains the characters which are most frequently used by any particular Alphabet. For example the CodePage on the computer you are using while reading this document will contain a representation of all the character combinations you can see on the keyboard in front of you. In the Western Roman alphabet this is predominantly A-Z, 0-9 and grammatical/punctuation characters (. , - ( ) * & % $ etc.).

If you were to write a document in the Western European CodePage which is designed to correctly render English, French, Spanish, Italian, German, Swedish, Icelandic. Then forcibly display the document using the CodePage designed for the Russian alphabet. The document would fail to render correctly, appearing as a random dispersal of characters throughout the body of the document. Making little to no sense to the reader.

In an attempt to minimise confusion, and to negate the technical need to understand, or even know your local CodePage. Most Operating Systems, word processors and web browsers will automatically attempt to detect the language being used, either by scanning the document, or looking for pointers left by the author. As an example, one of the first pieces of code received by a web browser when requesting any document from the HPC:Factor web server is a line informing the browser that the site is encoded using the Western European alphabet, and to use the appropriate (ISO-8859-1 [Latin1]) CodePage.

There is one notable exception on the Internet with the CodePage limitation of containing only 256 characters. UTF-8 which use 8-bit addressing. Using UTF-8 characters are displayed using between 1 and 4 bytes. (UTF-7, 16 and 32 are also valid CodePages, but these are not generally seen within web browsers, particularly the latter two)

How-to Guide:

There are occasions when automatic detection of a web page's intended encoding is unsuccessful, especially when it comes to inexperienced programmers. There are also instances where you may be using a device intended for use in another market which did not ship with your regional CodePage pre-set as default (causing pages with unknown encoding to render in the incorrect CodePage).

The following steps require the use of a registry editor. For more information on obtaining a registry editor see CESD-S-0082.

1. Close all Pocket Internet Explorer sessions
2. Open your devices registry editor
3. Navigate through the hierarchy to:
   HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\International
4. Using the table below, locate your preferred encoding type
5. Edit the value of the binary value Default_CodePage to match the CodePage (Hex) of your desired CodePage
   e.g. 04 E2 00 00 for Central European Alphabet (Windows)
6. Create a new Key and name it to match the CodePage (Decimal) value of your required encoding if it doesn't already exist
   e.g. 1250 for Central European Alphabet (Windows)
7. Enter the new key e.g. HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\International\1250\
8. Create a new Binary Value named IEFontSize
9. Set the value data to one of:
   04 00 00 00 - Defaults Browser Text Size to Largest
   03 00 00 00 - Defaults Browser Text Size to Larger
   02 00 00 00 - Defaults Browser Text Size to Medium
   01 00 00 00 - Defaults Browser Text Size to Smaller
   00 00 00 00 - Defaults Browser Text Size to Smallest
10. Close the registry editor and soft reset your device

If you make an error with the modifications to the Windows CE CodePage registry settings, Pocket Internet Explorer will be unable to render any page content correctly.

In the event that you are working out the hex equivalent of additional CodePage ID's be aware that the first two byte pair and the second two byte pair are inverted. The bytes 5 through 8 are required for the process to work correctly.
E.g. 04 E4 00 00 (1252) is entered at E4 04 00 00