# If I wrote a word in a non-Roman script in a post, how would it show up? **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [April 18, 2003, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-i-wrote-a-word-in-a-non-roman-script-in-a-post-how-would-it-show-up/169490 "2003-04-18T03:48:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![syncrolecyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@syncrolecyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/syncrolecyne)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2003, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-i-wrote-a-word-in-a-non-roman-script-in-a-post-how-would-it-show-up/169490/1 "2003-04-18T03:48:27Z")
Lets say I wanted to put in words in the original Cyrillic (or Greek)…like “правда”, аерофлот, водка, Бладимир Путин. Would it remain as such in the post, or would people without that encoding only see it as a bunch of random characters…something like äüéüíð? I might know some Russian, but I am completely computer illiterate… (when I preview posted I saw a long line of numeric characters in the text entry but the preview above showed the words in Cyrillic.) And while I have no such keyboard, could Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, or Korean writing show up too? ---
**Author:** ![syncrolecyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@syncrolecyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/syncrolecyne)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2003, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-i-wrote-a-word-in-a-non-roman-script-in-a-post-how-would-it-show-up/169490/2 "2003-04-18T03:51:14Z")
I also mispelled ‘Vladimir’…I still don’t have the hand of the Cyrillic keyboard… But the point of my question is does it look Cyrillic to everyone? ---
**Author:** ![IGJoe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/igjoe/32/5420_2.png) [@IGJoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/IGJoe)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2003, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-i-wrote-a-word-in-a-non-roman-script-in-a-post-how-would-it-show-up/169490/3 "2003-04-18T04:03:04Z")
It shows up as Cyrillic to me. BUT… I seem to recall something about posting in English only. Maybe someone could confirm or deny this for me? ---
**Author:** ![Achernar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e274bd/32.png) [@Achernar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achernar)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2003, 4:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-i-wrote-a-word-in-a-non-roman-script-in-a-post-how-would-it-show-up/169490/4 "2003-04-18T04:05:46Z")
I just tested it in Netscape 7, Mozilla 1, Opera 7, and IE 6, in Win2K. It looks Cyrillic in all of those. I predict that you’ll get the most trouble from IE 5- and Navigator, but I don’t have either of those browsers to test. Posting in another language is crucial to certain threads, like, for instance, translation questions. ---
**Author:** ![syncrolecyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@syncrolecyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/syncrolecyne)\ **Post date:** [April 18, 2003, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-i-wrote-a-word-in-a-non-roman-script-in-a-post-how-would-it-show-up/169490/5 "2003-04-18T04:40:20Z")
I don’t plan on making posts in Russian…just if hypotheticaly I used a single Russian word. I think there may be more use for Greek letters…like posting ‘pi’ or a Fraternity name. ---
**Author:** ![Spit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/76d3ee/32.png) [@Spit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spit)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2003, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/if-i-wrote-a-word-in-a-non-roman-script-in-a-post-how-would-it-show-up/169490/6 "2003-04-19T20:16:29Z")
Well, in the fight against ignorance, you have to have high standards. Knowing Russian is the second thing on the list.