Micron
20-03-2006, 09:35 AM
I was recently asked about this problem, whilst on a call out, and have realised that its quite common, so Ive posted a fix here.
If you see funny symbols in the text on some web pages, particularly where you would expect to see hyphens or apostrophes. What's wrong?
These strange symbols may look like this: http://www.experiencewindows.co.uk/images/sqq.jpg
You're viewing the site with the wrong code page. The code page is the assortment of characters your browser uses to render text, and it must match the code page that was used to create the site. Usually your browser picks the correct one automatically, but if you've previously changed the code page (or if another web site switched code pages on you), or if the web site doesn't specify the correct code page, the site won't display properly.
Internet Explorer
Go to > View > Encoding > Auto-Select. If there's already a checkmark next to Auto-Select, or if that doesn't help, go to View > Encoding > More, and choose the nationality that best matches the document you're viewing. The default code page for sites in English is Western European (Windows).
Firefox and Mozilla
Go to View > Character Encoding, and select Western (ISO-8859-1) for sites in English, or another nationalization that more closely matches the site you're viewing. If you find yourself returning to this menu often, go to View > Character Encoding > Customize to choose which code pages are displayed in the top-level menu. With either browser, some trial and error may be necessary before the site displays correctly.
If you see funny symbols in the text on some web pages, particularly where you would expect to see hyphens or apostrophes. What's wrong?
These strange symbols may look like this: http://www.experiencewindows.co.uk/images/sqq.jpg
You're viewing the site with the wrong code page. The code page is the assortment of characters your browser uses to render text, and it must match the code page that was used to create the site. Usually your browser picks the correct one automatically, but if you've previously changed the code page (or if another web site switched code pages on you), or if the web site doesn't specify the correct code page, the site won't display properly.
Internet Explorer
Go to > View > Encoding > Auto-Select. If there's already a checkmark next to Auto-Select, or if that doesn't help, go to View > Encoding > More, and choose the nationality that best matches the document you're viewing. The default code page for sites in English is Western European (Windows).
Firefox and Mozilla
Go to View > Character Encoding, and select Western (ISO-8859-1) for sites in English, or another nationalization that more closely matches the site you're viewing. If you find yourself returning to this menu often, go to View > Character Encoding > Customize to choose which code pages are displayed in the top-level menu. With either browser, some trial and error may be necessary before the site displays correctly.