Re: Was: REQ: Star Shape. Now: Funny off topics...

roz...@terraworld.net (Rozberk Omniist) writes:

>And welcome to "Little Know Facts about ASCII"!!!  And to win todays
>ascii-drawing of a million dollars, which contestant can answer these
>questions....

yes, i sure could use a million dollars.  even in ascii.  :)

>1.  What are the corrent names for these characters? 
>~ ^ & | {} and #

~ = tilde
^ = caret (or as they say in french, l'accent circonflexe)
& = ampersand
| = pipe or vertical bar
# = pound
and a bonus
* = star
i am beginning to believe it is star over asterisk now.  when using a phone,
they say "star" (e.g., star 6 9).  most automated messages refer to # as
pound though).

oh, and { } are nicknames "curly" braces, but i think left and right brace
would be the official name.

' = apostrophe, but what is ` ?
is ` also apostrophe?

>2.  What control character is designated as the "bell"?
>(we'll accept either ascii code or control keys)

007, ctrl-G.  next question.

>3.  [tricky] Using the american extended ASCII [sometimes called
>"Standard Extended ASCII"?], how many characters can be called
>"letters" in both english and foreign languages?
>(hint: this is like your "Terminal Font" on Windows-based computers)

i don't know the exact number.  only 127 are typable i believe.  after
that, there are e's with accents and o's with umlauts and all kinds of
weird stuff.  i don't know.  if i were to guess, i'd say 21.

>And as a special bonus quesiton:  Why is the five-pointed "star"
>charater shown as a "six"-pointed star on the IBM-compatible keyboard?
>(no fair looking at the "8" key, either)

because it is displayed as a 6 pointed star.  at least in america.
i don't know what it is in other countries.

>Thanks for playing!!  Goo'day.

interesting question:

why was the cent sign omitted as an ascii character?

--
brian odom