User-defined characters (UDCs) in a national language environment

The following problems have been encountered with Z and I Emulator for Web running in a national language environment:

User-Defined Characters with Internet Explorer 4.0 and Netscape 4

JVMs for these browsers do not currently support the display or input of User-Defined Characters; however, there are workarounds.

Internet Explorer 4.0 for Windows 98 and Windows NT has its own workaround. Use the Gaiji editor to create user-defined characters. (Click Start > Programs > Accessories to access the editor.)

For Netscape 4 for Windows and HotJava for Windows, you must change the browsers' font-properties file to register a class for character-set conversion. For details, refer to the files in the \ZIEForWeb\zieweb\samples\fonts\dbcs_udc directory after installation. This contains a sample class for character-set conversion, a sample font-properties file, and instructions.

DBCS Gaiji mapping table

Z and I Emulator for Web users can remap UDC (user-defined characters) between the host and the local workstation. The Z and I Emulator for Web server provides a UDC mapping editor. Users can use this editor to change the mapping of user defined-characters between the host and the local workstation. Before users start a session (3270, 5250, 3270 host print), they can edit the configuration property of this session in order to use customized UDC mapping instead default mapping.

User-defined characters for host-printing sessions

For Host Printing support of User-Defined Characters (UDCs), you must prepare a UDC font-image file. On a server, this file must be located in the \ZIEForWeb\zieweb\fonts\ directory for access by clients. On a locally-installed client, the file must be located in the \ZIEForWeb\lib\fonts directory.

On Windows 98 or NT, you must run the w32udcnv.exe utility to convert Windows user-defined fonts into a usable font-image file. The utility is provided in the udc directory on the Z and I Emulator for Web CD. It is not copied to the server or client during installation. To use the utility:

  1. Run w32udcnv.exe.
  2. Click Convert to start the conversion and generate a font-image file. After conversion, the font-image file is saved in the C: drive's root and is named according to the language of the operating system you are running:
    Platform Font-image filename
    Japanese Windows jpn24.fnt
    Korean Windows kor24.fnt
    Simplified Chinese Windows chs24.fnt
    Traditional Chinese Windows cht24.fnt
  3. Copy the font-image file to the \ZIEForWeb\zieweb(or lib) \fonts directory.

On an OS/2 server, copy the OS/2 font-image file $SYS1Z24.FNT to the \ZIEForWeb\zieweb\fonts directory and rename it according to the table above.

Unicode Support of UDCs (Japan only)

On Japanese Windows 2000, a unicode version utility, w32udcnvw.exe, is provided to convert Windows user-defined fonts into a usable font-image file. If you use this utility to convert the UDCs on Windows 2000, all the UDCs defined by unicode are converted. Z and I Emulator for Web can print not only the UDCs defined in local workstation codes (totally 1880 characters), but also those defined in unicode including the host UDCs (0x6941-0x89BD for 930/939, 0x6941-0x7FFE for 1390/1399).

Limitations

  • In a Traditional Chinese Windows environment, there are 13 more UDCs than IBM's Big5 UDCs. Therefore, if the last 13 UDCs are defined in the range of 0xC8F2-0xC8FE, they are ignored by the utility and cannot be used.
  • In a Korean Windows environment, only local code page 949 is supported. You can define and print 188 UDCs in the ranges of 0xC9A1-0xC0FE and 0xFEA1-0xFEFE.

Displaying User-Defined Characters with a Java 2-enabled browser on the Windows platform

On the Windows platform, if a 3270 Display session or a 5250 Display session has been configured to use a User-Defined Character (UDC) mapping table, and that session is to be run on a Java 2-enabled browser, then in order for the UDC characters to be displayed at all the browser must be using at least the following level of Java 2 plug-in:

  • For Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese, and Japanese:
    • IBM Java 2 Plug-in
    • Sun Java 2 Plug-in version
  • For Korean:
    • Sun Java 2 Plug-in