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[Unicode] How to -- Full Unicode display in Agent's message body pane

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Ralph Fox

unread,
Jan 4, 2020, 3:01:10 AM1/4/20
to
Happy New Year!

Here is how to get full Unicode text display in Agent's message body pane.
This works in the plain text viewer (but not in the HTML viewer).


1. REQUIREMENTS

1.1 Windows 10 version 1903 or higher. IMPORTANT - the config here
won't work without it.
1.2 A 32-bit version of Agent which uses .cod files. This means
Agent 1.6 or later. Agent 7.00 or later is recommended.
1.3 The ability to edit your own AGENT.INI file.


2. RESULTS

This is an example screen-shot: <https://i.imgur.com/JEPDF1v.png>


3. CONFIG INSTRUCTIONS

All of these config steps are required before it will work.
Doing half these steps will not get it half working.


3.1 COD FILE

Create a text file "cp65001.cod" with the contents between
the wavy lines near the bottom of this message. The file
must be named "cp65001.cod", not "cp65001.cod.txt".

Place a copy of the file "cp65001.cod" into your Agent
program folder (the folder where agent.exe is).

Now restart Agent so that it loads the new .cod file
"cp65001.cod".


3.2 AGENT LANGUAGE SETTINGS

Go to Agent's "Languages" panel
[Agent 1.x - 2.0] "Options >> General Preferences >> Languages"
[Agent 3.0 - 8.00] "Tools >> Options >> Languages"

Create a new language (say) "Unicode UTF-8 (English)" based on
your existing language (say) "English".

Adjust the settings for the new language "Unicode UTF-8 (English)"
as below:
3.2.1 Set 'Codepage' to "Unicode FULL UTF-8 (Codepage 65001)"
3.2.2 Set 'Send Usenet As' to "Unicode FULL UTF-8 (us-ascii, UTF-8)"
3.2.3 Set 'Send Email As' to "Unicode FULL UTF-8 (us-ascii, UTF-8)"
Do _not_ set 'Default Charset' to UTF-8.

Screen-shot: <https://i.imgur.com/BN6NlKB.png>

Do not change the 'Codepage' of your existing language(s) (say
'English') to Codepage 65001. If you change this, it will
trash the 8-bit "extended ascii" characters in your existing
sent messages.

If you already have a language with Codepage 65001 then you
can re-use it. Otherwise, create a new language in Agent to
avoid trashing your existing sent messages.


3.3 AGENT FONT SETTINGS

Go to Agent's "Fonts" panel
[Agent 1.x] "Options >> Display Preferences >> Fonts"
[Agent 2.0] "Options >> General Preferences >> Display >> Fonts"
[Agent 3.0 - 8.00] "Tools >> Options >> Display >> Fonts"

Select your new language (say) "Unicode UTF-8 (English)" in
the drop-down. Then adjust the font settings for your new
language.

To display as many Unicode characters as possible, it is important
which font you select. I find the best results (most characters)
are with these fonts
Variable Pitch (proportional): Tahoma
Fixed Pitch (monospaced): Lucida Console

Set the 'Variable Pitch Body', 'Fixed Pitch Body', and 'Printer'
fonts.

When setting the fonts for a language in Agent, we normally
set the font's 'Script' setting to match the language's 'Code
Page' setting. But the Windows font dialog does not show an
option for UTF-8 (Codepage 65001) in the 'Script' drop-down.
In this case we need to edit AGENT.INI to set the font's
'Script' setting to UTF-8.

Each time you update the font settings, you will also need
to edit AGENT.INI again.


3.4 EDIT AGENT.INI

Close Agent, then edit your AGENT.INI file.
Find the [Language<x>] section for the language
"Unicode UTF-8 (English)".

In that section, the 'Variable', 'Fixed', and 'Printer'
settings will have a font name followed by six numbers. To
set the font's 'Script' to UTF-8, set the last (6th) number
to 254. [This only works in Windows 10 version 1903 and
later.]

Screen-shot: <https://i.imgur.com/0kKbXh6.gif>

If you update the font settings in Agent for "Unicode UTF-8
(English)", you will also have to edit AGENT.INI again and
do this again.


4. TEST IT WORKS

When you have done the configuration, test it:
4.1 Select this message.
4.2 Change this message's language to "Unicode UTF-8 (English)"
[Agent 1.x - 2.0] "Message >> Language"
[Agent 3.0 - 8.00] "Edit >> Language"
4.3 Look at the Unicode text below. It should show Unicode
characters instead of question marks.

***************************************************************

ℂ𝕠𝕟𝕘𝕣𝕒𝕥𝕦𝕝𝕒𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟𝕤! 𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕕𝕚𝕕 𝕚𝕥!

𝐇𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐲 𝐍𝐞𝐰 𝐘𝐞𝐚𝐫
𝕱𝖗𝖔𝖍𝖊𝖘 𝕹𝖊𝖚𝖊𝖘 𝕵𝖆𝖍𝖗
С Новым Годом
Καλή Χρονιά
Շնորհավոր Նոր Տարի
नया साल मुबारक
༄༅།།ལོ་གསར་ལ་བཀྲ་ཤིས་བདེ་ལེགས་ཞུ།
สวัสดีปีใหม่
新年快樂
새해 복 많이 받으세요
あけましておめでとうございます
Ngā mihi o te tau hou
ᐊᐢᐱᓄᔦ
ᎤᎵᎮᎵᏍᏗ ᎢᏤ ᎠᏕᏘᏱᏍᎬ
𝑩𝒍𝒘𝒚𝒅𝒅𝒚𝒏 𝑵𝒆𝒘𝒚𝒅𝒅 𝑫𝒅𝒂
📆 🕛 🕭 🎉 🍾 🥂 🍻 🎶 🕺💃

***************************************************************


FILE

File cp65001.cod
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ COPY ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Name: cp65001
Description: Unicode FULL UTF-8
Version: 1
Codepage: 65001
Charset: UTF-8, csUTF8, UNICODE-1-1-UTF-8
Inbound-Charsets: ascii, utf7, cp65001, iso-8859-1, iso-8859-2, iso-8859-3, iso-8859-4, iso-8859-5, iso-8859-6, iso-8859-7, iso-8859-8, iso-8859-9, iso-8859-10, iso-8859-11, iso-8859-13, iso-8859-14, iso-8859-15, cp437, cp850, cp932, cp936, cp949, cp950, cp1250, cp1251, cp1252, cp1253, cp1254, cp1255, cp1256, cp1257, cp1258, cp1361, cp54936, iso-2022-cn, iso-2022-jp, koi8, koi8u, koi8ru, macroman, norwegian, swedish, tis-620, viscii
Outbound-Charsets: cp65001, Unicode FULL UTF-8, ascii, cp65001
Outbound-Charsets: utf7, Unicode UTF-7#STR_OCS_UTF7, ascii, utf7
Outbound-Charsets: ascii, ASCII Only#STR_OCS_ASCII, ascii
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ COPY ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


--
Kind regards
Ralph
🦊

Bart Dinnissen

unread,
Jan 4, 2020, 12:37:14 PM1/4/20
to
On Sat, 04 Jan 2020 21:01:05 +1300, in alt.usenet.offline-reader.forte-agent Ralph Fox
<-rf-nz-@-.invalid> wrote:

>Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, Ralph.

>Here is how to get full Unicode text display in Agent's message body pane.

Your suggestions have always been useful in the past, so I am definitely going to try this.
I'll report back when I have.

TIA,

--
Bart Dinnissen

Puffer Belly

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Jan 4, 2020, 8:43:29 PM1/4/20
to
Thanks, works as advertised. Now your message is displayed in Agent as
it is in Thunderbird.

PB

Ralph Fox

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Jan 5, 2020, 12:28:04 PM1/5/20
to
On Sat, 4 Jan 2020 19:43:27 -0600, Puffer Belly wrote:

> Thanks, works as advertised. Now your message is displayed in Agent as
> it is in Thunderbird.
>
> PB


Thank you for the confirmation.


--
Kind regards
Ralph
🦊

Bart Dinnissen

unread,
Feb 9, 2020, 10:51:24 AM2/9/20
to
On Sat, 04 Jan 2020 21:01:05 +1300, in alt.usenet.offline-reader.forte-agent Ralph Fox
<-rf-nz-@-.invalid> wrote:

>Happy New Year!
>
>Here is how to get full Unicode text display in Agent's message body pane.
>This works in the plain text viewer (but not in the HTML viewer).

[...]

> 3.2 AGENT LANGUAGE SETTINGS
>
> Go to Agent's "Languages" panel
> [Agent 1.x - 2.0] "Options >> General Preferences >> Languages"
> [Agent 3.0 - 8.00] "Tools >> Options >> Languages"
>
> Create a new language (say) "Unicode UTF-8 (English)" based on
> your existing language (say) "English".
>
> Adjust the settings for the new language "Unicode UTF-8 (English)"
> as below:
> 3.2.1 Set 'Codepage' to "Unicode FULL UTF-8 (Codepage 65001)"
> 3.2.2 Set 'Send Usenet As' to "Unicode FULL UTF-8 (us-ascii, UTF-8)"
> 3.2.3 Set 'Send Email As' to "Unicode FULL UTF-8 (us-ascii, UTF-8)"

These options were not in the drop down list. It took me a while to figure out why. Seems I have
twee Agent directories, I don't know why. After I copied the cod-file to the second too I could
select it fine.

> 3.4 EDIT AGENT.INI
>
> Close Agent, then edit your AGENT.INI file.

I couldn't find that too.

The I remembered it should be in the data files, which I found by looking at the folder properties.

>4. TEST IT WORKS
>
> When you have done the configuration, test it:
> 4.1 Select this message.
> 4.2 Change this message's language to "Unicode UTF-8 (English)"
> [Agent 1.x - 2.0] "Message >> Language"
> [Agent 3.0 - 8.00] "Edit >> Language"
> 4.3 Look at the Unicode text below. It should show Unicode
> characters instead of question marks.
>
> ***************************************************************
>
> ℂ𝕠𝕟𝕘𝕣𝕒𝕥𝕦𝕝𝕒𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟𝕤! 𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕕𝕚𝕕 𝕚𝕥!

Many thanks!

--
Bart Dinnissen

Bart Dinnissen

unread,
Feb 9, 2020, 10:52:28 AM2/9/20
to
On Sun, 09 Feb 2020 16:51:21 +0100, in alt.usenet.offline-reader.forte-agent Bart Dinnissen
<dinn...@chello.nl> wrote:

By the way, I use Agent 6.00/32.1186.

--
Bart Dinnissen

Ralph Fox

unread,
Feb 10, 2020, 1:07:29 AM2/10/20
to
On Sun, 09 Feb 2020 16:51:21 +0100, Bart Dinnissen wrote:

>> 4. TEST IT WORKS
>>
>> When you have done the configuration, test it:
>> 4.1 Select this message.
>> 4.2 Change this message's language to "Unicode UTF-8 (English)"
>> [Agent 1.x - 2.0] "Message >> Language"
>> [Agent 3.0 - 8.00] "Edit >> Language"
>> 4.3 Look at the Unicode text below. It should show Unicode
>> characters instead of question marks.
>>
>> ***************************************************************
>>
>> ℂ𝕠𝕟𝕘𝕣𝕒𝕥𝕦𝕝𝕒𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟𝕤! 𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕕𝕚𝕕 𝕚𝕥!
>
> Many thanks!


You're welcome. Thank you for the confirmation.


--
Kind regards
Ralph
🦊

domi...@ottello.net

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Feb 29, 2020, 9:25:14 AM2/29/20
to
Le samedi 4 janvier 2020 09:01:10 UTC+1, Ralph Fox a écrit :
> Happy New Year!

> Kind regards
> Ralph
> 🦊
Hello and thank you very much.
I have adapted for Unicode UTF-8 (French) and it works perfectly.

Since the development of Forté Agent has been stopped for five years, I was desperate to find a solution for this UFT-8 display problem in messages.
Thanks again.

Otomatic

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Mar 2, 2020, 5:35:50 AM3/2/20
to
Ralph Fox <-rf-nz-@-.invalid> écrivait :

> ????? ??? ????
> ?????? ????? ????
> ? ????? ?????
> ???? ??????
> ????????? ??? ????
> ??? ??? ??????
> ?????????????????????????????????
> ????????????
> ????
> ?? ? ?? ????
> ???????????????
> Ng? mihi o te tau hou
Hi,

It works very well to visualize in "Full Unicode" in the "body pane",
it's well written in the subject.

But, where it is a problem is in the answer editing pane, either when
answering from a "Full Unicode" view (Edit -> Language -> Unicode UTF-8
(French)) or from a "Normal" view (French).

Although the quote from the original message is displayed in Unicode, it
is not transmitted as is.

If you are responding from a "Full Unicode" view, diacritical characters
such as é è à ù, etc. are replaced by the symbol ? in a diamond that
means unknown character in utf-8.

I looked at all the possible options in the menus and in the agent.ini
file but I couldn't find anything that would make it possible to set the
answer editing window to Full Unicode.

I make two answers:
- The first one by replying from a "Full Unicode (French)" view.
- The second one by answering from a "French" visualization.

Thanks
--
Aujourd'hui, l'idéal du progrès est remplacé par l'idéal de l'innovation :
il ne s'agit pas que ce soit mieux, il s'agit seulement que ce soit
nouveau, même si c'est pire qu'avant et cela de toute évidence.
Henry de Montherlant - Va jouer avec cette poussière

Otomatic

unread,
Mar 2, 2020, 5:35:50 AM3/2/20
to
Ralph Fox <-rf-nz-@-.invalid> écrivait :

> 𝐇𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐲 𝐍𝐞𝐰 𝐘𝐞𝐚𝐫
> 𝕱𝖗𝖔𝖍𝖊𝖘 𝕹𝖊𝖚𝖊𝖘 𝕵𝖆𝖍𝖗
> С Новым Годом
> Καλή Χρονιά
> Շնորհավոր Նոր Տարի
> नया साल मुबारक
> ༄༅།།ལོ་གསར་ལ་བཀྲ་ཤིས་བདེ་ལེགས་ཞུ།
> สวัสดีปีใหม่
> 新年快樂
> 새해 복 많이 받으세요
> あけましておめでとうございます
> Ngā mihi o te tau hou

Ralph Fox

unread,
Mar 2, 2020, 12:50:54 PM3/2/20
to
You are welcome. Thank you for the feedback.


--
Kind regards
Ralph
🦊

Ralph Fox

unread,
Mar 2, 2020, 1:22:13 PM3/2/20
to
On Mon, 02 Mar 2020 11:35:49 +0100, Otomatic wrote:

> Ralph Fox <-rf-nz-@-.invalid> écrivait :
>
>> 𝐇𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐲 𝐍𝐞𝐰 𝐘𝐞𝐚𝐫
>> 𝕱𝖗𝖔𝖍𝖊𝖘 𝕹𝖊𝖚𝖊𝖘 𝕵𝖆𝖍𝖗
>> С Новым Годом
>> Καλή Χρονιά
>> Շնորհավոր Նոր Տարի
>> नया साल मुबारक
>> ༄༅།།ལོ་གསར་ལ་བཀྲ་ཤིས་བདེ་ལེགས་ཞུ།
>> สวัสดีปีใหม่
>> 新年快樂
>> 새해 복 많이 받으세요
>> あけましておめでとうございます
>> Ngā mihi o te tau hou
> Hi,
>
> It works very well to visualize in "Full Unicode" in the "body pane",
> it's well written in the subject.
>
> But, where it is a problem is in the answer editing pane, either when
> answering from a "Full Unicode" view (Edit -> Language -> Unicode UTF-8
> (French)) or from a "Normal" view (French).
>
> Although the quote from the original message is displayed in Unicode, it
> is not transmitted as is.


When I do it like this, the quote is both displayed and transmitted in Unicode,

1. Change the language of the original message to "Full Unicode" before replying.
2. Then click reply.
The language of the composition window will be automatically set to
"Full Unicode", the same as the original message.
3. Keep the language of the composition window as "Full Unicode" when
transmitting.


> If you are responding from a "Full Unicode" view, diacritical characters
> such as é è à ù, etc. are replaced by the symbol ? in a diamond that
> means unknown character in utf-8.
>
> I looked at all the possible options in the menus and in the agent.ini
> file but I couldn't find anything that would make it possible to set the
> answer editing window to Full Unicode.


To enter diacritical characters such as é è à ù, etc. in a "Full Unicode"
composition window, see this message:

https://groups.google.com/d/msg/alt.usenet.offline-reader.forte-agent/vA-Oc13Vnuw/uTJeJCGJFAAJ
news:0stc5eth8bajl32uu...@4ax.com

When the composition window is in "Full Unicode", it will show you
what the results will look like when transmitted.


> I make two answers:
> - The first one by replying from a "Full Unicode (French)" view.
> - The second one by answering from a "French" visualization.
>
> Thanks


There is another problem you may come across.

The spelling checker will not correctly handle words containing
diacritical characters such as é è à ù, etc.


--
Kind regards
Ralph
🦊
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