Chinese Encoding

November 7, 1996

Chinese Language Encoding

Due to political difference, there are four character sets that are used for encoding of Chinese language email. These four character sets are used in different parts of the Chinese speaking world.

GB

GB is used on mainland China and Hong Kong. It uses the simplified Chinese characters used on mainland China.

GBK

GBK can be used for sending email to mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. It uses both the simplified Chinese characters (used on mainland China), and the traditional Chinese characters (used in Taiwan).

CNS

CNS is used in Taiwan. It uses the traditional characters used in Taiwan, and specifically allows the representation of the more obscure Chinese characters that were used in the literature written during the old days.

BIG5

BIG5 is an industrial standard used in Taiwan and Hong Kong. It is based on an older draft of CNS.

Filters For Sending And Receiving Chinese Language Email

The filter we recommend is ncf. ncf stands for Network Chinese Filter.

It enables translation between all the different character sets: GB, GBK, CNS, BIG5. This means email written on mainland China can be read on Taiwan machines, and vice versa. It leaves English applications to remain as they are.

ncf is available via ftp from:
ftp://ftp.net.tsinghua.edu.cn/pub/Chinese/ncf/