# UTF-8 in rails

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/utf-8-in-rails/147885>\
**Category:** Rails I18n\
**Created:** [September 6, 2008, 2:23pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/utf-8-in-rails/147885 "2008-09-06T14:23:01Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![difei](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/a4c791/32.png) [@difei](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/difei)\
**Post date:** [September 6, 2008, 2:23pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/utf-8-in-rails/147885/1 "2008-09-06T14:23:01Z")

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Greetings all,

Just hours ago I found the :with options of helpers like  
validates\_format\_of seems UTF-8 compatible (for instance, “/.{2}/”  
matches exactly two UTF-8 characters instead of a length 2 UTF-8  
string). I am wondering if there are any documentation about this UTF-8  
compatible methods? Are there any UTF-8 compatible regex engine in ruby  
itself? TIA!

Difei

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![difei](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/a4c791/32.png) [@difei](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/difei)\
**Post date:** [September 15, 2008, 10:34am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/utf-8-in-rails/147885/2 "2008-09-15T10:34:40Z")

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Ruby has kind-of UTF-8 compatible regexp: single character matches  
single UTF-8 character (when given UTF-8 encoding directive, which is  
default in Rails), not single byte. But character classes, such as  
[:alfa:], work only for ASCII. For general UTF-8 regex with character  
classes, you can use Oniguruma gem…

izidor