> > (1) it assumes that all filenames are, fundamentally, encoded character
> >    sequences;
> 
> The GTK applications do need to display the filenames using X11. How to do
> that without assuming that filenames are encoded character sequences?
> 
> > (2) it assumes that all filenames encountered during a given run use
> >    the same encoding.
> 
> See above - how to display them without this assumption, if you can't
> determine the encoding?
>  
> > Neither of these is a safe assumption.
> 
> Unfortunately both seem to be necessary for good usability. Or do you have
> any other algorithm to display filenames and transforming keyboard input
> to filenames in mind?

strvis(3), strunvis(3) would do the job very well, except that users would
probably hate the result... ;-)

	Regards,
		-- Jachym Holecek