Hi,

I have a webapplication in perl which uses UTF-8 everywhere. At the top of my scripts is "use open ':utf8';" and "use open ':std';" which makes everything work correctly. Without these lines 'special' characters that come f.e. from the database turn into question marks in the browser.

Recently I added a file upload option to the application, but when I try to upload, I get tons of errors in my log complaining about bad utf-8:

[Wed Aug 15 20:55:42 2007] [error] [client 127.0.0.1] [Wed Aug 15 20:5
+5:42 2007] script.pl: Malformed UTF-8 character (unexpected continuat
+ion byte 0x99, with no preceding start byte) in index at (eval 44) li
+ne 15., referer: http://localhost/formtest.html
[Wed Aug 15 20:55:42 2007] [error] [client 127.0.0.1] [Wed Aug 15 20:5
+5:42 2007] script.pl: Malformed UTF-8 character (byte 0xff) in index 
+at (eval 44) line 15., referer: http://localhost/formtest.html
[Wed Aug 15 20:55:42 2007] [error] [client 127.0.0.1] [Wed Aug 15 20:5
+5:42 2007] script.pl: Malformed UTF-8 character (unexpected non-conti
+nuation byte 0x0d, immediately after start byte 0xd9) in index at (ev
+al 44) line 15., referer: http://localhost/formtest.html
[Wed Aug 15 20:55:42 2007] [error] [client 127.0.0.1] [Wed Aug 15 20:5
+5:42 2007] script.pl: Wide character in print at (eval 38) line 85., 
+referer: http://localhost/formtest.html

[download]

The uploaded file is totally corrupt when saved (btw I use CGI.pm). It seems that the file is not sent as UTF-8 for some unknown reason; I do specify UTF-8 charset in my forms and html, and the http headers confirm that it's supposed to be UTF-8.

When I remove the two "use open" lines from my perl script, the uploads go fine, but then the special chars are screwed in my app. It's a multi lingual site so correct display of special chars like c cedille and umlauts is essential. Hence the choice for UTF-8.

I'm caught between a rock and a hard place. How do I get out?

In reply to UTF-8 woes with file upload by Farenji

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