On my professional computer (Windows XP), using Internet Explorer 8.0, when I go to the page http://www.guidetojapanese.org/copula.html, the kanji do not display and are replaced by a square.

Under the same IE, I opened two tabs:
- one with the page http://www.guidetojapanese.org/copula.html
- one with this message I'm currently typing in. If I copy and paste the first square from the page http://www.guidetojapanese.org/copula.html into the text field I'm currently typing, it turns into a kanji: 魚 (sakana).

Why are the kanji not displaying on the Tae Kim's web pages? Also, I seem to be unable to install asia languages on my PC since I have not the installation CD and not sure my IT department has them. Can I download Asian fonts manually instead of requiring the Windows installation CDs?

Try Firefox

If you can see the characters anywhere, then you have fonts already installed. Your default IE font is probably just set to something that only has English characters.

Don't ask me how to change it because I haven't used IE for like 7 years and Windows for 3.

I should have done that before posting, but I tried the same page in Firefox: it works like a charm. Sh*t, why not in IE?

Because of what I said in my post..

If you have the choice of Firefox and IE, why are you using IE? Do you need it for any specific reason, I only use IE when forced to at school

My corporate Intranet does only work on IE. That's why :-(

There's an extension called IE Tab that you can setup so that it opens your intranet using IE inside a tab within Firefox automatically.

IE-only pages still exist outside of Korea?

YogaSpirit Wrote:My corporate Intranet does only work on IE. That's why :-(

How does the intranet work? If it's simply through a proxy, you could set up firefox go through the same proxy and you wouldn't have to use IE =)

Or spoof the user-agent..

The intranet may be activeX infested though, in which case there is no hope.

No-one else seems to have suggested this, so try clicking the View menu on the menu bar, then select the correct encoding option, there are normally 3 types of Japanese encoding. You don't need japanese support installed to use this option, I should think.

jasdev Wrote:No-one else seems to have suggested this, so try clicking the View menu on the menu bar, then select the correct encoding option, there are normally 3 types of Japanese encoding. You don't need japanese support installed to use this option, I should think.

You still do need East Asian fonts installed, which is off by default in XP install. Wrong character encoding never results in boxes anyways (afaik). Box = unicode's way of saying the character isn't in the font you're using.

Jarvik7 Wrote:IE-only pages still exist outside of Korea?

Some IT guy is now shedding a bitter tear at the thought he has to go back tomorrow and deal with the next batch of virus infested bug ridden machines, simply because his employers rely on severely outdated IE6-only web apps.