FAQ : Frequently Asked Questions
FAQ Table of contents
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12. Q:  Some special characters I key in my HTML source members show different on my Web pages.
Why? How can I solve this?

A:  The following special characters,
    #  @  ! 
    {  }  [  ]  | 
which have special meanings for HTML and JavaScript, will not show correctly in your Web pages, unless you make sure that, before entering SEU, your job CCSID matches the language of your keyboard.

Do the following:

Step 1- Check out system value qccsid.
HTTP server jobs are initiated with a CCSID value taken from system value QCCSID. If a CGI runs with CCSID=65535, the CCSID of the external html loaded by the CGI is not properly converted to the CCSID expected by the HTTP server for the output response, and CGI may get into severe troubles.
See also Step 4.
If you experience troubles with system value QCCSID 65535 and you cannot change system value QCCSID to another value (e.g. 37) because this would impact some production, see FAQ#1 about restarting your HTTP instance with a given CCSID value.


Step 2- Make sure that your HTML source or stream file contains the correct characters

The CCSID of the 5250 emulator session, must match the language of your keyboard.
Do the following:
  1. dspjob option(*runa)
    and page down twice to display the Coded character set identifier
  2. on your PC go through the Settings to find out the language of your keyboard.
If the CCSID of your job does not match (see the table below) the language of your keyboard, use command
    chgjob ccsid(...)
to set it properly, than start SEU or display your stream file.
The following table lists the major keyboard languages and the corresponding CCSID's:
keyboard language CCSID
US, Canada, Portugal, Brazil, New Zealand, Australia 37
Netherlands 256
Austria, Germany 273
Denmark, Norway 277
Finland, Sweden 278
Italy 280
Spain, Latin America 284
United Kingdom 285
France 297
Greece 423 | 875
Israel 424
Iceland 871
Turkey Latin-3 905


Step 3- Make sure that your HTML contains the following <meta ... > tag:

<html>
<head>
... ... ...
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
... ... ...
</head>

Step 4- Make sure that the HTML from your CGIs is not translated from a CCSID to another CCSID

The CCSID of the HTTP job running the CGI and the CCSID specified in your HTTP configuration must be the same. If this is not true, then special characters in your HTML source are converted to the wrong values in the resulting web pages. To find out what's going on:
  1. Use command
        wrkactjob sbs(qhttpsvr)
    to display your HTTP server jobs.
    Select one of the appropriate jobs with a 5 to display it.
    Select option 2 to display its definition, page down twice and take a note of its Coded character set identifier
  2. Use command
        wrkhttpcfg
    to display the configuration of the HTTP server you care for.
    Check if you have any DefaultFsCCSID directive there.
    If you find none, then your HTTP server uses the CCSID from the AS/400 system value QCCSID.
Now:
  • If the CCSID of the HTTP server job matches that of the related HTTP configuration, your CGIs have no problem.
  • If the two CCSID do not match, your CGIs are in trouble and you have to make them matching.
    To achieve this matching
    • in the appropriate HTTP configuration add a
      DefaultFsCCSID ccsid_value
      directive to match the CCSID of the HTTP server job.
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