Web and XML Glossary

UTF-32 is the UTF that serializes a Unicode code point as a sequence of four bytes, in either big-endian (UTF-32BE) or little-endian UTF-32LE format. An initial sequence corresponding to U+FEFF is interpreted as a BOM, it is used to distinguish between the two byte orders. The BOM is not considered part of the content of the text. A serialization of Unicode code points into UTF-32 may or may not begin with a BOM The term UTF-32 can be used ambiguously. When referring to the encoding of Unicode in memory, there is no associated byte orientation, and a BOM is never used. When referring to a serialization of Unicode code points into bytes, it may have a BOM and either byte orientation..