Original Usenet thread from alt.ascii-art, started 10 Mar 1995.
Talk: WWW text
alt.ascii-art
· 10 messages · 10 Mar 1995 - 27 Mar 1995
OK time to stop lurking (again) and offer a suggestion to the budding
Ascii-artists out in 'Netland!
In case you hadn't noticed, WWW pages are becoming the latest 'in-thing'
on the InterNet.
Most of the pages are full of Gif files and only look good on graphical
browsers like Netscape or Mosaic. However, not everyone uses graphical
browsers to read WWW pages, many people use text-only browsers such
as Lynx.
When Lynx sees a Gif file, it simply puts up the word [IMAGE] and
continues. However when writing a Web page, you are allowed to add
the command ALT="" after all your Gif files. This allows Lynx to
display whatever appears inbetween the quotation marks instead of just
[IMAGE].
Where does Ascii-Art come in? Well, many WWW pages often contain similar
graphic buttons, such as bullet points, 'next' and 'back' buttons,
sound file buttons and the like.
What I am suggesting is that the Ascii-artists should get together and
suggest 'standard' text replacements for the most common graphic images.
Here are a couple of suggestions:
[<-] back
[->] next
The only limitation is keeping the text on a single line.
Let your imagination run free and see what you can come up with!
DR J
______________________________________________________________________________
..... .....
,,$$$$$$$$$, ,$$$$$$$$$$,
;$' '$$$$: ;$' '$$$$:
$: $$$$: $: $$$$: It's much
$ o_)$$$: $ o_) $$$: easier when
;$, _/\ &&:' ;$, _/\ &&:' you can surf
' /( &&& ' /( &&& in three
\_&&&&' \_&&&&' dimensions!
&&&&. &&&&.
&&&&&&&: &&&&&&&&:
______________________________________________________________________________
--
______________________________________________________________________________
me90drj : "It's an old code sir, but it checks out. I was about to clear him."
is94drj : "....5....4....3...Wait! What's that red light?...."
______________________________________________________________________________
------========http://http1.brunel.ac.uk:8080/~is94drj========------
Bob Allison (bob...@wwa.com) wrote:
: FWIW, I put up a Web page with comparisons and averages of the results of
: three Web surveys. Unfortunately, (unless all three surveys were way
: off), most people, 80% to 90%, are using graphical browsers.
True, but 10-20% is a big minority! ;-) Seriously, it might be possible
to persuade the authors of Web browsers to make their programs display
the ALT tag instead of a 'sheet of paper' when the Auto-Load images
option is turned off. This would greatly speed up the download times,
wouldn't it?
: >Here are a couple of suggestions:
: >
: >[<-] back
: >[->] next
: Remember that characters like < and > are used in the invisible command
: structure on the Web, and you must escape them to make them appear
: without screwing things up.
AArrggh! I spotted that after I posted the article! Thanks for pointing
it out!!! Funnily enough, Lynx doesn't translate 'Escape characters'.
It faithfully displays the < and > characters, it's the graphical
browsers that try to translate them.
Hmmmmm. Well, after extensive research, it would seem that you can get
away with using the < character, but NOT the > character.
Perhaps these two arrows could be a start :
[ -={ ] Back
[ }=- ] Next
They make good swords! ;-)
={===---
: You can also make ASCII substitutes for use with divider lines. So
: when a graphical browser sees a fancy GIF divider line, people using text
: based browsers (like Lynx) would see:
: /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
Now this is something I like.
-._.-'"`-._.-'"`-._.-'"`-._.-'"`-._.-'"`-._.-'"`-._.-'"`-._.-'"`-._.-'"`-._.-
-- * -- * -- * -- * -- * -- * -- * -- * -- * -- *-- * -- * -- * -- * -- * --
- - -- --- ---------===========((((*))))===========--------- --- -- - -
It would seem that this WWW text is trickier than I thought!
DR J
______________________________
_______ / _______________ ______
_____________________________ _______ /_______/ (_______________) (______|
____________________________ /_______/ _ _ _ __ _
___________________________ / | | | | |__/ / | |
____________________________\ _______ | | | | __ < __ | |
_____________________________\_______\ _______ | |__/ /| | \ \ \ \_| |
\_______\ |_____/ |_| \_\ \____|
\______________________________
--
______________________________________________________________________________
me90drj : "It's an old code sir, but it checks out. I was about to clear him."
is94drj : "....5....4....3...Wait! What's that red light?...."
______________________________________________________________________________
------======== URL:http://http1.brunel.ac.uk:8080/~is94drj/ ========------
In article <3jon7d$2n...@gagme.wwa.com>, Bob Allison <bob...@wwa.com> wrote: >Remember that characters like < and > are used in the invisible command >structure on the Web, and you must escape them to make them appear >without screwing things up. Before 'wrapping' your art in <PRE> </PRE> tags, do global search-and-replace, for: & ---> & [do this first, because you'll be adding more &'s] > ---> > < ---> < You don't need to put any extra spaces before or after these substitutions. > And you have to tag ASCII art with <pre> or <tt>. Mosaic ignores <tt> for some reason-- stick with <pre>, in general. Lynx apparently has a known bug that causes it to ignore > and/or < ...but that should be fixed in the next release... >>The only limitation is keeping the text on a single line. I strongly recommend playing with clickable ascii art (see http://www.mcs.net/~jorn/html/net/readable.html for a discussion of this with some examples). You can safely break lines between the '<a' and the 'href="[URL]">' Check out: http://www.mcs.net/~jorn/html/jj.html for a portrait of James Joyce with blue eyes (not really clickable, just for fun) and http://www.mcs.net/~jorn/html/net/a.html for an abstract composition with black, blue, and (in Netscape) purple characters... j robot wisdom home page jor...@mcs.com http://www.mcs.net/~jorn/
In article <3k092c$g...@gagme.wwa.com>, is9...@brunel.ac.uk (DR J) writes: > > Bob Allison (bob...@wwa.com) wrote: > : >Here are a couple of suggestions: > : > > : >[<-] back > : >[->] next > : Remember that characters like < and > are used in the invisible command > : structure on the Web, and you must escape them to make them appear > : without screwing things up. > AArrggh! I spotted that after I posted the article! Thanks for pointing > it out!!! Funnily enough, Lynx doesn't translate 'Escape characters'. > It faithfully displays the < and > characters, it's the graphical > browsers that try to translate them. > Hmmmmm. Well, after extensive research, it would seem that you can get > away with using the < character, but NOT the > character. > Perhaps these two arrows could be a start : > [ -={ ] Back > [ }=- ] Next What about a nice simple [BACK] [NEXT] system. This is simple and unambiguous. > > It would seem that this WWW text is trickier than I thought! > DR J /--\___/--\ _____ Richard G.Coleman |"Our computers don't \/\ O o /\/ ___/ Bark\ Computer Science | run on electricity ( o ) \ Bark/ Strathclyde University | but on magic smoke, -----U------------------------------------------|when the smoke leaves Also of that unknown band from Ayr "Baked Alaska"| the computer, it email me at: rco...@cs.strath.ac.uk | stops working."
is9...@brunel.ac.uk (DR J) writes: >In case you hadn't noticed, WWW pages are becoming the latest 'in-thing' >on the InterNet. >Most of the pages are full of Gif files and only look good on graphical >browsers like Netscape or Mosaic. However, not everyone uses graphical >browsers to read WWW pages, many people use text-only browsers such >as Lynx. And those of us who believe in our the power of the vt100 and still use it instead of Mosaic or Netscape over a SLIP connection, 'cuz it's so much faster. >When Lynx sees a Gif file, it simply puts up the word [IMAGE] and >continues. However when writing a Web page, you are allowed to add >the command ALT="" after all your Gif files. This allows Lynx to >display whatever appears inbetween the quotation marks instead of just >[IMAGE]. That's because the authors too lazy and/or incompetent... You can give a text alternative (for browsers that aren't graphical (read: lynx)) for the picture with the following: <IMG SRC="Back.gif" ALT="Back"> or in your cutsie arrows: <IMG SRC="Back.gif' ALT="[<-]"> But what I want to know is how to make a multi line alternative, so we can replace the pictures with cute ascii representations. >Where does Ascii-Art come in? Well, many WWW pages often contain similar >graphic buttons, such as bullet points, 'next' and 'back' buttons, >sound file buttons and the like. >What I am suggesting is that the Ascii-artists should get together and >suggest 'standard' text replacements for the most common graphic images. >Here are a couple of suggestions: >[<-] back >[->] next Realtime image interpretation? It's too much of a pain.
jor...@mcs.com (Jorn Barger) writes: >In article <3jon7d$2n...@gagme.wwa.com>, Bob Allison <bob...@wwa.com> wrote: >>Remember that characters like < and > are used in the invisible command >>structure on the Web, and you must escape them to make them appear >>without screwing things up. >Before 'wrapping' your art in <PRE> </PRE> tags, do global >search-and-replace, for: >& ---> & [do this first, because you'll be adding more &'s] >> ---> > >< ---> < Yes. But DON'T DO THIS IN THE TEXT ALTS. This won't work with lynx on text alt's. I was about to post this same response, but then I realized that lynx just puts the text up real fast without interpreting it... the > & < just appear as > & < etc. >You don't need to put any extra spaces before or after these >substitutions. >> And you have to tag ASCII art with <pre> or <tt>. >Mosaic ignores <tt> for some reason-- stick with <pre>, in general. >Lynx apparently has a known bug that causes it to ignore > and/or >< ...but that should be fixed in the next release... Eh? It works fine for me. I've been developing a man page server that does it just fine, and I almost always test it with lynx.
g...@superdec.uni.uiuc.edu (gg) wrote: > >But what I want to know is how to make a multi line alternative, so we >can replace the pictures with cute ascii representations. This is pretty easy, just put the graphic in a <pre> block like this: <pre> <image "hi.gif" alt =" * * *** * * * **** * * * * * * *** "> </pre> For better examples, check "http://www.yak.net:80/Tohu-Bohu/". The title is lame ascii lettering. There's a better example on the "album" link: "http://www.yak.net:80/Tohu-Bohu/bwalbum.html". For those of you without browsers, or who are stuck with graphical ones, here's the Boojie-Woojie man (from an original drawing by Dave Wooten): . +-/o\ +-/o|o\-+ \|||/ _ .-, |---| ( '\,_,-' |---| `=___ |---| '\ |___| `\ \ \ `\ _________________________',--', `\ `\' ''|||;___' `\, `\ '|; ||,______________________\ `\ |---|' `\ |___| `\ ______|___|_______ `\ ,/'' ||||| \ /~~\ _)`\ /' ||||| | `-' `\_,| | ||||| /' `\ ||||| __/' `\ ,/|||||\,(_ _ | |' ||||| ~(__ /'` `, | |, ||||| ,| (__/' | / `\|||||/' | ,' ||||| |' / MMMMMMMmm, /' /~~\ ,' ___ | | _ | | |` _ '\, | \/'/' \, `\_/' | \___,-~ `\__ _/' \~ ,,/~```--,__________,=-' \, _-~} ,,/' /~ \ _-~ _/' /' /``\ ,/ ~-___-~ ,-'' | | \,| `/ \_/ || | ,/ |,/ `/ /'__ ____,/',' `\ {,,___,/' ;__/' -Jeph ~-_-~-_-~-_-~_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~_-~-_-~-_-~-_-~_- Jeff Lefferts | JLe...@EA.com http://www.yak.net/Tohu-Bohu/ - for - Fyunkeristic Yasmagasmic Music
In article <3ka9mr$et...@gagme.wwa.com>, gg <g...@superdec.uni.uiuc.edu> wrote: >But what I want to know is how to make a multi line alternative, so we >can replace the pictures with cute ascii representations. Before your <img src="image.gif" ALT="Here's the ASCII alternative">, you should put a <pre> which still permits the ASCII art (including almost all punctuation and all spaces) to be reproduced the same. Then after the closing ">" you should put </pre> to return to normal HTML. Take a look (download the source if you like) at the following URL using a text browser or even the latest Netscape beta with image loading turned off: http://www.dcs.aber.ac.uk/~bmh1/seagulls/main_index.html It contains a Figlet title and the image in my sig (except that I was unable to use quotes (") so I made to with tildes (~) --- I even tried using " to get a quote but it just displayed " :^( The only other character I _know_ you can't use is the > symbol ). Another one, where the GIF is entirely replaced by Figlet text is an unfinished page at: http://web.cps.msu.edu/~seneris/wes/wes.html BTW, if you use <li> for bulleted lists, lynx gives you asterisks, * Cheerio, Ryan. .oo8888oo. o8888o. Ryan Harding - supporter of "The Seagulls" `Y88o.o888o."888o. .o88888888P `"888oo. Brighton & Hove Albion. Purveyors of fine -d88888888888oo. football and great acts of giantkilling `""Y88888P""Y8oo Albion Web URL: http://www.dcs.aber.ac.uk/~bmh1/seagulls/main_index.html ..and now for my regular sig. ___________________________________________________________________________ Ryan Harding. Applied Optics Group, Physics Lab, Univ of Kent at Canterbury Web homepage URL: http://www-bprc.mps.ohio-state.edu/cgi-bin/hpp/ryan.html
rkh...@ukc.ac.uk wrote:
: In article <3ka9mr$et...@gagme.wwa.com>, gg <g...@superdec.uni.uiuc.edu> wrote:
: >But what I want to know is how to make a multi line alternative, so we
: >can replace the pictures with cute ascii representations.
: Before your <img src="image.gif" ALT="Here's the ASCII alternative">, you
: should put a <pre> which still permits the ASCII art (including almost
: all punctuation and all spaces) to be reproduced the same. Then after
: the closing ">" you should put </pre> to return to normal HTML.
Yup, you need the <PRE> otherwise the spaces get condensed, unfortunately
not all HTML editors let you put images inside <PRE> markers. If you have
the command ALT=" at the end of the line and then start the text on the
next line it makes it easier to line up.
: Take a look (download the source if you like) at the following URL using a
: text browser or even the latest Netscape beta with image loading turned off:
I'm trying to set up similar things on my Home Page too! (see sig.)
: It contains a Figlet title and the image in my sig (except that I was
: unable to use quotes (") so I made to with tildes (~) --- I even tried using
: " to get a quote but it just displayed " :^( The only other
: character I _know_ you can't use is the > symbol ).
AFAIK Lynx does not decode the 'Escape characters' that the graphical
browsers (Netscape, Mosaic, etc.) use to display the <, >, " and &
characters. My advice is avoid using all of these four characters when
putting ALT text in a Web page.
The " tells the browser that you have closed off the ALT tag, the <
and > characters tell it that the anchor has closed or another one is
opening and the & character does something that has escaped me right now!
DR J
______________________________________________________________________________
..... .....
,,$$$$$$$$$, ,$$$$$$$$$$,
;$' '$$$$: ;$' '$$$$:
$: $$$$: $: $$$$: It's much
$ o_)$$$: $ o_) $$$: easier when
;$, _/\ &&:' ;$, _/\ &&:' you can surf
' /( &&& ' /( &&& in three
\_&&&&' \_&&&&' dimensions!
&&&&. &&&&.
&&&&&&&: &&&&&&&&:
______________________________________________________________________________
--
______________________________________________________________________________
me90drj : "It's an old code sir, but it checks out. I was about to clear him."
is94drj : "....5....4....3...Wait! What's that red light?...."
______________________________________________________________________________
------======= <URL:http://http1.brunel.ac.uk:8080/~is94drj/> =======------
By the way! I have an ASCII pic on my WWW page. The address is:
http://www.unlv.edu/~jades There really isn't much else on there yet,
so don't get peeved about that.
--
If life was like a cartoon, what would our cartoons be like?
The Jaded Fox | ()_() | |\/| ____|FDC Sir Cubbi - Last of the
Joshua Strom | (_) |.__.. \ /\ /| Great Gummi Knights!
str...@nevada.edu| RAD HOST | \_ /__/ \/ |FDC strur-around Oliver
Go UNLV Rebels! | Email me any | _/ ___ __/ |--The New Gummi Chronicles--
Live free or die|RAD questions!|/___/____/ |Writer and Storyboard Artist
I'm still working on becoming a Voice Actor, just wait!
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