Strange error in IE

Question

I have a URL with unicode characters in it

http://www.argaam.com/Common/Handlers/DownloadAttachment.aspx?referer=/portal&fileName=اعمار. -الربع الثاني_633857794599657020.pdf&folder=\CompanyFinancialResults\

this is working fine in FireFox and Chrome and Safari but when the request if sent from IE the server sends me to an Error page.

OK i got the request the server recieves and its like this

IE

GET /Common/Handlers/DownloadAttachment.aspx?referer=/portal&fileName=?????.%20-?????%20??????_633857794599657020.pdf&folder=\CompanyFinancialResults\ HTTP/1.1

FireFox

GET /Common/Handlers/DownloadAttachment.aspx?referer=/portal&fileName=%D8%A7%D8%B9%D9%85%D8%A7%D8%B1.%20-%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B1%D8%A8%D8%B9%20%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AB%D8%A7%D9%86%D9%8A_633857794599657020.pdf&folder=\CompanyFinancialResults\ HTTP/1.1

So for some reason IE is not encoding the multibyte characters properly !!

Anyone has any idea why?

Answer 1

It looks like the URL has multi-byte characters in it, I havent expereinced this, so not sure if thats part of the issue? Also the URL looks like it has a filename, it could be that filenames with those characters cannot exist or the file does not exist?

Answer 2

Try making the registry changes documented on this page at Microsoft:

• Internet Explorer May Not Connect to Web Sites with Multibyte Character Set Link or URL

To work around this behavior, you must add a registry value. Add a DWORD registry value named MBCSServername with a data value of 0 to the following registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings

Answer 3

Your link should be URLEncoded when placed in the HTML, rather than relying on the browser to try to encode the URL for you. (IE's behavior for which varies depending on the client's OS/language, etc).