# File lib/vmail/message_formatter.rb, line 134
    def utf8(string, this_encoding = encoding)
      return '' unless string
      out = if this_encoding && this_encoding.upcase != 'UTF-8' 
              Iconv.conv('UTF-8//TRANSLIT/IGNORE', this_encoding, string)
            elsif this_encoding.upcase == 'UTF-8' 
              string 
            else
              # assume UTF-8
              Iconv.conv('US-ASCII//TRANSLIT/IGNORE', 'UTF-8', string)
            end
      out
    rescue
      "[error: #$!]"
    end