PSConfig revisited: character analysis

After yesterday's brush with covert crazy hyphens, a related tip seems in order.

This isn't the first time I've been burned by non-standard characters.  Several years back I created a small classic ASP utility (yes, it's THAT old) that analyzes a string and spits out the unicode values; you can use it in the iframe below.

As a sample, here are two identical sections of the PSConfig script -- one with proper dashes, and one with the offending content.  You can copy/paste each into the tool below to see how obvious the problem is.

Normal:
Psconfig -cmd configdb -create -server <SQL_servername> -database <precreated_configDB>

Disturbed:
Psconfig –cmd configdb –create –server <SQL_servername> -database <precreated_configDB>

 Alpha characters are shown in blue, with numerics in green.  Normal "extra" characters are yellow/beige, and out-of-range weirdness is highlighted in red.