title: Can a PHP file name (or a dir in its full path) have UTF-8 characters?
body: <p>I would like to access a PHP file whose name has UTF-8 characters in it.</p>
  
  <p>The file does not have a BOM in it. It just contains an echo statement that displays a few unicode characters.</p>
  
  <p>Accessing the PHP page from the browser (FireFox 3.0.8, IE7) results in HTTP error 500.</p>
  
  <p>There are two entries in the Apache log (file is /க.php; the letter க is a composite one and corresponds to the characters \xe0\xae\x95 in the log below):</p>
  
  <p>[Sat Apr 04 09:30:25 2009] [error] [client 127.0.0.1] PHP Warning:  Unknown: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in Unknown on line 0</p>
  
  <p>[Sat Apr 04 09:30:25 2009] [error] [client 127.0.0.1] PHP Fatal error:  Unknown: Failed opening required 'D:/va/ROOT/\xe0\xae\x95.php' (include_path='.;C:\php5\pear') in Unknown on line 0</p>
  
  <p>The same page works when file and dir names are in English. In the same setup, there is no problem using SSI for these pages.</p>
  
  <p><em>EDIT</em></p>
  
  <p>Removed info on url rewriting since it does not seem to be a factor.</p>
  
  <p>When mod_rewrite is removed, the PHP file still does not work. Works if the file is renamed to a non-UTF name. However, shtml works even with UTF characters in file and/or path name.</p>