Most Mac text file processing programs and other tools can automatically detect the encoding of a file, but if the wrong encoding is used, a file may be fully or partially illegible. Different operating systems sometimes use different ways to represent the ending of a line of text. The only way that I can properly save files as text files in Japanese is to explicitly select 'Other encoding - Japanese (Mac OS)' or 'Other encoding - Japanese (Windows/DOS)' upon saving the file. However, when I load the same text file back in, I have to reload it using the Unicode setting.

Saves a text file using the same or another encoding Peep is a 'hexeditor'-style native OSX app with the emphasis on text encoding. There are many different text encoding systems (ways of representing characters within a file) and a file doesn't necessarily know what encoding it's in.

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I'm trying to enter some UTF-8 characters into a LaTeX file in TextMate (which says its default encoding is UTF-8), but LaTeX doesn't seem to understand them.

Running cat my_file.tex shows the characters properly in Terminal. Running ls -al shows something I've never seen before: an '@' by the file listing:

(And, yes, I'm using usepackage[utf8]{inputenc} in the LaTeX.)

Best text editor 2017 for mac. In general, Atom presents a wise choice, particularly for MEAN web developers.

I've found iconv, but that doesn't seem to be able to tell me what the encoding is -- it'll only convert once I figure it out.

Peter Mortensen

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James A. RosenJames A. Rosen

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15 Answers

The @ means that the file has extended file attributes associated with it. You can query them using the getxattr() function.

There's no definite way to detect the encoding of a file. Read this answer, it explains why.

There's a command line tool, enca, that attempts to guess the encoding. You might want to check it out.

To save your AutoText entry in the “Normal.dotm” template, click “Save”. Building block text galleries ms word for mac.

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codelogiccodelogic

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Using the -I (that's a capital i) option on the file command seems to show the file encoding.

Andrew

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TimTim

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In Mac OS X the command file -I (capital i) will give you the proper character set so long as the file you are testing contains characters outside of the basic ASCII range.

For instance if you go into Terminal and use vi to create a file eg. vi test.txtthen insert some characters and include an accented character (try ALT-e followed by e) then save the file.

They type file -I text.txt and you should get a result like this:

test.txt: text/plain; charset=utf-8

cale_b

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CloudrangerCloudranger

You can also convert from one file type to another using the following command :

e.g.

RPMRPM

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aliased somewhere in my bash configuration as

Word for mac variable text. so I just type

On my vanilla OSX Yosemite, it yields more precise results than 'file -I':

jmettrauxjmettraux

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bx2bx2

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Using file command with the --mime-encoding option (e.g. file --mime-encoding some_file.txt) instead of the -I option works on OS X and has the added benefit of omitting the mime type, 'text/plain', which you probably don't care about.

AdamAdam

Classic 8-bit LaTeX is very restricted in which UTF8 characters it can use; it's highly dependent on the encoding of the font you're using and which glyphs that font has available.

Since you don't give a specific example, it's hard to know exactly where the problem is — whether you're attempting to use a glyph that your font doesn't have or whether you're not using the correct font encoding in the first place.

Here's a minimal example showing how a few UTF8 characters can be used in a LaTeX document:

You may have more luck with the [utf8x] encoding, but be slightly warned that it's no longer supported and has some idiosyncrasies compared with [utf8] (as far as I recall; it's been a while since I've looked at it). But if it does the trick, that's all that matters for you.

Will RobertsonWill Robertson

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The @ sign means the file has extended attributes. xattr file shows what attributes it has, xattr -l file shows the attribute values too (which can be large sometimes — try e.g. xattr /System/Library/Fonts/HelveLTMM to see an old-style font that exists in the resource fork).

Jouni K. SeppänenJouni K. Seppänen

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Typing file myfile.tex in a terminal can sometimes tell you the encoding and type of file using a series of algorithms and magic numbers. It's fairly useful but don't rely on it providing concrete or reliable information.

A Localizable.strings file (found in localised Mac OS X applications) is typically reported to be a UTF-16 C source file.

dreamlaxdreamlax

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Synalyze It! allows to compare text or bytes in all encodings the ICU library offers. Using that feature you usually see immediately which code page makes sense for your data.

pi3pi3

You can try loading the file into a firefox window then go to View - Character Encoding. There should be a check mark next to the file's encoding type.

jmdeamerjmdeamer

Which LaTeX are you using? When I was using teTeX, I had to manually download the unicode package and add this to my .tex files:

Now, I've switched over to XeTeX from the TeXlive 2008 package (here), it is even more simple:

As for detection of a file's encoding, you could play with file(1) (but it is rather limited) but like someone else said, it is difficult.

KeltiaKeltia

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Text File Encoding For Mac