Change file encoding

Set the file encoding for this repository to UTF-8 so non-ASCII characters render consistently. Update .vscode/settings.json with "files.encoding": "utf8" and convert any current files detected as ISO-8859-1 to UTF-8, validating they still open correctly in the editor.

Before I commit the encoding change, make it easy for reviewers: produce a short list of files that will be re-encoded, show one example diff where non-ASCII characters could break, explain the compatibility benefit of UTF-8, and flag any tools in CI that might assume a different encoding.

I set files.encoding to utf8 and converted source files, but the nightly build process now logs garbled messages and an older toolchain process reads some files incorrectly. I don't know which files the toolchain expects to be in Latin-1 versus UTF-8 or whether the CI environment locale changed. Should I revert the conversions, add explicit encoding flags to the build, or inspect the toolchain's file inputs first? Recommend the most likely diagnosis and the next command I should run to isolate the problem.

Across repositories, encoding changes keep popping up and occasionally break legacy tools or CI jobs. We lose time reverting and reconciling. What habit or lightweight safeguard should we adopt so encoding changes are safe and predictable? Suggest a single practice that prevents these regressions and a one-line checklist to require before encoding conversions.