Oh, maybe I know the reason for the confusion. I do talk about the *Perl* level, while you often talk about the *implementation*. When I say byte or octet string below, I mean on the Perl level. For example, on the Perl level, upgrading a string does not change its semantics anywhere except w.r.t. to bugs and unpack: It still stays an octet string if it was an octet string before. (Thats of course all in line with me not wanting to expose the UTF-X flag). -- The choice of a -----==- _GNU_ ----==-- _ generation Marc Lehmann ---==---(_)__ __ ____ __ pcg@goof.com --==---/ / _ \/ // /\ \/ / http://schmorp.de/ -=====/_/_//_/\_,_/ /_/\_\ XX11-RIPEThread Previous | Thread Next