While working through the previous generalized proposal for escape schemes it became obvious that it was becoming overly complicated for what are believed to be a small number of escaping mechanisms. It had become particularly difficult to define the rules for when escaping should be used 'when needed' The attached proposal is much simplified and covers just three variants of escaping mechanisms. - The use of a single escape character to cause the next character to be interpreted literally. The escape character itself is escaped by the escape escape character. - The use of a pair of escape strings to cause the enclosed group of characters to be interpreted literally. The ending escape string is escaped by an escape escape character. - The use of a pair of escape strings to cause the enclosed group of characters to be interpreted literally. An alternate pair of escape strings is used when the data contains the first ending escape string. I have also introduced an extraEscapedCharacters property which is a list of additional single characters which must be escaped as a get out for other mechanisms Alan Powell MP 211, IBM UK Labs, Hursley, Winchester, SO21 2JN, England Notes Id: Alan Powell/UK/IBM email: alan_powell@uk.ibm.com Tel: +44 (0)1962 815073 Fax: +44 (0)1962 816898 Unless stated otherwise above: IBM United Kingdom Limited - Registered in England and Wales with number 741598. Registered office: PO Box 41, North Harbour, Portsmouth, Hampshire PO6 3AU