<snip> > However, there are a number of ways to go around that. The simplest way > is to use replacement characters for the German umlauts: ae for ä, oe for > ö, and ue for ü. This is normally accepted both in Switzerland and > Germany. > This is not only accepted, but HIGHLY recommended when using e-mail ! The problem is that still quite a few 7-bit computers are around - and whenever an e-mail hits one of them on the way to the recipient, umlauts and other special characters (which require 8 bit !) are either lost or converted. In most cases the recipient will see =E4 instead of a-umlaut (small) =F6 instead of o-umlaut (small) =FC instead of u-umlaut (small) =C4 instead of A-umlaut (capital) and so on : not at all comfortable to read ! The following is a (rather extreme) example : > > =3D=3D=3D=3D=3DB=E4chler = > =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D= > =3D=3D=3D > >=20 > > BE D=E4rstetten 1575 > >=20 > > = > =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D= > =3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D Check at the bottom of http://www.genealogy.net/gene/reg/CH/surins-e.htm for recommended alternatives in standard ASCII (i.e. 7 bit) characters : first and last column of this table. Best regards - Wolf ---------------------- Wolf W. Seelentag, PhD, e-mail : wolf@swissmail.com Reherstr. 19, CH - 9016 St. Gallen, Switzerland Tel (home) : +41-71-2885121 Fax : +49-89-2443-91987 Tel (work) : +41-71-4942233