Recently I came across a strange issue with the encoding of simple xml files. Our head developer have set a hook in the svn for not allowing us to commit code files with utf-8 bom encoding. Never had problems until today that suddenly I started getting error messages. But i never added bom to my files! How this may happened? Usually, if you have to do a quick change and you used notepad as an editor. I know, I know… who is using this piece of s….oftware in 2012? Me, accidentally though and once! So after spending some time in Google the easiest way i found to fix the xml file was with the option that Notepad++ offers. Check the screenshot below. It is in Encoding -> Convert to UTF-8 without BOM or Encode in UTF-8 without BOM. If you want to learn more by the way about BOM check this article in wikipedia.