And another irked gist, which turned out to be unneeded after all.

URLUtil.encode

    /**
     * So java.net.URLEncoder#encode(java.lang.String) is deprecated, because it uses the OS' default encoding,
     * java.net.URLEncoder#encode(java.lang.String, java.lang.String) takes a second parameter for said encoding,
     * while mentioning that "The World Wide Web Consortium Recommendation states that UTF-8 should be used.
     * Not doing so may introduce incompatibilites.". (typo not mine).
     * Still, we have to choose, read doc, and specify the ourselves, and deal with the uncanny possibility that
     * UTF-8 might not be available on a system where we do have a 1.6 JVM.
     * Right.
     */
    public static String encode(String s) {
        try {
            return URLEncoder.encode(s, "UTF-8");
        } catch (UnsupportedEncodingException e) {
            throw new RuntimeException("Dude, running Java 1.6 but not supporting UTF-8 ? What is wrong with you ?", e);
        }
    }