"The " { $vocab-link "unicode.normalize""unicode.normalize" } " vocabulary defines words for normalizing Unicode strings. In Unicode, it is often possible to have multiple sequences of characters which really represent exactly the same thing. For example, to represent e with an acute accent above, there are two possible strings: \"e\\u000301\" (the e character, followed by the combining acute accent character) and \"\\u0000e9\" (a single character, e with an acute accent). There are four normalization forms: NFD, NFC, NFKD, and NFKC. Basically, in NFD and NFKD, everything is expanded, whereas in NFC and NFKC, everything is contracted. In NFKD and NFKC, more things are expanded and contracted. This is a process which loses some information, so it should be done only with care. Most of the world uses NFC to communicate, but for many purposes, NFD/NFKD is easier to process. For more information, see Unicode Standard Annex #15 and section 3 of the Unicode standard."
