Default UTF-8 encoding for new Notepad documents

转自：http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-windows_programs/default-utf-8-encoding-for-new-notepad-documents/525f0ae7-121e-4eac-a6c2-cfe6b498712c

Applies To: Windows | Windows 7 | Programs

Short of using a third party editor, is there a way to configure Notepad so that new documents are automatically saved in Unicode without having to change manually the encoding every single time from default ANSI to UTF-8?

Typical scenario:

- Start typing some text with no extended characters
- Save the file: It is automatically in ANSI
- Open the file again to edit, add some extended characters, save again:
Notepad tells you the extended characters will be lost if you confirm the save operation.

At least that last message offers the possibility to backup and "Save as" to choose UTF-8, but 1) this is very cumbersome, and 2) files with no extended characters will still be saved in ANSI by default.

Windows won't really be fully Unicode if the default Notepad encoding is still the obsolete ANSI code page, but, even if I reluctantly admit changing default behaviors is tricky for compatibility reasons, there should at least be a user option to select the default encoding for new documents, like other third party editors offer, such as Notepad++.

Currently, Windows forces me to replace Notepad file associations to use other text editors. Not a bad thing given the poor set of features in Notepad, but it would have been great to have this option in the standard O.S.