I'm having some problems with a web application of mine.
To make things clearer here is an html input form which shows it. The form inputs two strings with GET and POST and, BTW, uses HTML::Mason.
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
    <title>Test utf</title>
    <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"
+>
</head>
<body>
    <form name="formutfget" method="GET">
        Enter text (get):<br>
        <input type="text" name="textget" size="20" maxlength="30">
    </form>
    <form name="formutfpost" method="POST">
        Enter text (post):<br>
        <input type="text" name="textpost" size="20" maxlength="30">
    </form>
    Value of GET: <% $textget %><br>        
    Hex of GET: <% $hexget %><br>
    Value of POST: <% $textpost %><br>
    Hex of POST: <% $hexpost %><br>        
</body>
</html>
<%args>
    $textget => ''
    $textpost => ''
    $hexget => ''
    $hexpost => ''
</%args>
<%init>
    $hexget = unpack('H*', $textget);
    $hexpost = unpack('H*', $textpost);
</%init>

[download]
The strange thing is that running this form under these environments

Debian Woody - perl 5.6.1 - Mozilla 1.4.3/Firefox 1.0
Debian Sid - perl 5.8.4 - Mozilla 1.4.3/Firefox 1.0

using as input the string "Δωδεκανήσων", I get

Value of GET: Δωδεκανήσων
Hex of GET: 
26233931363b26233936393b26233934383b26233934393b26233935343b2623393435
+3b26233935373b26233934323b26233936333b26233936393b26233935373b

[download]
Value of POST: Δωδεκανήσων
Hex of POST: 
26233931363b26233936393b26233934383b26233934393b26233935343b2623393435
+3b26233935373b26233934323b26233936333b26233936393b26233935373b

[download]

while in OpenBSD 3.3 - perl 5.8.0 - Mozilla 1.4.3/Firefox 1.0 with the same input string I get

Value of GET: Δωδεκανήσων
Hex of GET: ce94cf89ceb4ceb5cebaceb1cebdceaecf83cf89cebd
Value of POST: Δωδεκανήσων
Hex of POST: ce94cf89ceb4ceb5cebaceb1cebdceaecf83cf89cebd

So, it seems that in the former I get escaped unicode characters and in the latter UTF-8 ones.
I thought that it could be a 5.6 vs 5.8 difference but as you can see even under Debian Sid I got the same unicode chars.
Could it be an OpenBSD peculiarity? I've Googled it but with no luck, maybe someone can shed some light on it...

Thanks!

2005-01-09 Janitored by Arunbear - added code tags around long hex strings, to prevent distortion of site layout

In reply to Differences in UTF-8 html form by Realbot

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