RFC 2237 (rfc2237) - Page 1 of 6


Japanese Character Encoding for Internet Messages



Alternative Format: Original Text Document



Network Working Group                                          K. Tamaru
Request for Comments: 2237                         Microsoft Corporation
Category: Informational                                    November 1997



           Japanese Character Encoding for Internet Messages


Status of this Memo

   This memo provides information for the Internet community.  It does
   not specify an Internet standard of any kind.  Distribution of this
   memo is unlimited.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (C) The Internet Society (1997).  All Rights Reserved.

1. Abstract

   This memo defines an encoding scheme for the Japanese Characters,
   describes "ISO-2022-JP-1", which is used in electronic mail [RFC-
   822], and network news [RFC 1036]. Also this memo provides a listing
   of the Japanese Character Set that can be used in this encoding
   scheme.

2. Requirements Notation

   This document uses terms that appear in capital letters to indicate
   particular requirements of this specification. Those terms are
   "MUST", "SHOULD", "MUST NOT", "SHOULD NOT", and "MAY". The meaning of
   each term are found in [RFC-2119]

3. Introduction

   RFC 1468 defines the way Japanese Characters are encoded, likewise
   what this memo defines. It defines the use of JIS X 0208 as the
   double-byte character set in ISO-2022-JP text.

   Today, many operating systems support proprietary extended Japanese
   characters or JIS X 0212, This includes the Unicode character set,
   which does not conform to JIS X 0201 nor JIS X 0208. Therefore, this
   limits the ability to communicate and correspond precise information
   because of the limited availability of Kanji characters. Fortunately
   JIS (Japanese Industry Standard) defines JIS X 0212 as "code of the





Tamaru                       Informational