Linewrap and more!

In article <199...@ladder01.news.aol.com>,
   pet...@aol.com (PeteCasso) wrote:

<snip>

>While I am at it, I might as well comment on a related topic: how many
>characters per line for posting on the web.
>
>Theoretically there is no limit, because you can always scroll sideways 
on
>the webpage. A practical limit may be the desire to present the entire
>picture on a common 14" screen without scrolling. With a font size of 
6,
>you can easily get 160 characters across the width of the screen, twice
>the resolution of the old "80 characters" wisdom. This will help a lot 
in
>smoothing edges, you can think of having the midposition of a character
>width available to you, etc, etc. (Why not use an even smaller font 
size?
>Because it is difficult to get support for font sizes smaller than 6).
>

There are some of us whose eyes are not quite so good. I prefer to use a 
font size of 10, to avoid squinting.


>And while I am at it, here are even more ideas.
>
>One could utilize the ability to scroll sideways on a webpage to 
deliver
>360 degrees panoramic views, which would be the ascii equivalent of
>Virtual Reality, I think it would be perfectly justified to call 
creations
>of this nature "ascii Virtual Reality". 
>

I *can't stand* scrolling sideways. I set my wordwrap at 72 to avoid 
this. But an interesting idea.

>Of course, one could also utilize the ability to scroll vertically "to
>look up and down". Utilizing both scroll funtions, i.e. sideways and
>vertically, would allow you to depict an entire hemisphere, e.g. the 
stars
>in the Northern or Southern hemisphere. 
>
>Of course, one could add Java animation on top of it to depict the 
passage
>of the stars in the course of the night, etc, etc.
>

<snip>

---
mnu...@ma.ultranet.com

This message written with 100% recycled letters.

In the FAQ that Colin regularly posts, there is a line towards the end
saying something like "76 characters to avoid linewrap" and I would like
to comment on that.

In the olden days, people tend to say "80 characters to avoid linewrap",
but I believe that is only taking into account the server specifications
of SMTP, POP3 (for email), NNTP (for newsgroups), etc. It is not taking
into account that the various clients may linewrap well under 80
characters. For example, my favorite email client is Claris Emailer, a Mac
only program and may therefore not be very well known. It is IMO far
superior than the ubiquitous Eudora (available for Mac and Windows), but
the editor does linewrap at 75 characters. This has been deliberately done
to allow for ">"quoting up to 5 levels deep without worrying about
linewrapping for email purposes, but ascii art will linewrap at 75
characters.

Also, some NNTP clients seem to linewrap at 75 characters or below that. I
received linewrap reports on a 75 character wide cartoon (Frogstein and
Birdstein, The Grand Piano), although I don't know which particular NNTP
clients have caused the linewrap (I rarely receive anything more than a "I
got a damaged copy, can you send me a good one?" kind of message).

The question then comes up: What then is a safe width? How many characters
per line?

I have a 72 character wide cartoon (Frogstein and Birdstein, Surfing) that
received very wide circulation (I gather that it must have gone cycles and
cycles through the internal mail system of a UK based company, etc),
without getting any linewrap reports. So, 72 characters seems to be a safe
width.

I have also 73 and 74 wide character cartoons, for which I have received
no linewrap reports, but I have no indication that these cartoons have
received very wide circulation either.

Also, I have been advised that my cartoons have been used in Internet
chats without me getting linewrap reports, but I think that people tend to
use smaller
cartoons in these cases which also tend to be narrower.

Based on the above, I believe that the FAQ is inaccurate.

I think: 

72 characters is a safe width in terms of linewrap
73 and 74 characters is a grey area
75 characters is not a safe width, some email and newsgroup clients will
linewrap

While I am at it, I might as well comment on a related topic: how many
characters per line for posting on the web.

Theoretically there is no limit, because you can always scroll sideways on
the webpage. A practical limit may be the desire to present the entire
picture on a common 14" screen without scrolling. With a font size of 6,
you can easily get 160 characters across the width of the screen, twice
the resolution of the old "80 characters" wisdom. This will help a lot in
smoothing edges, you can think of having the midposition of a character
width available to you, etc, etc. (Why not use an even smaller font size?
Because it is difficult to get support for font sizes smaller than 6).

And while I am at it, here are even more ideas.

One could utilize the ability to scroll sideways on a webpage to deliver
360 degrees panoramic views, which would be the ascii equivalent of
Virtual Reality, I think it would be perfectly justified to call creations
of this nature "ascii Virtual Reality". 

Of course, one could also utilize the ability to scroll vertically "to
look up and down". Utilizing both scroll funtions, i.e. sideways and
vertically, would allow you to depict an entire hemisphere, e.g. the stars
in the Northern or Southern hemisphere. 

Of course, one could add Java animation on top of it to depict the passage
of the stars in the course of the night, etc, etc.

Compared to ANSI/VT animation techniques, Java alone adds nothing new in
terms of visual effects, and although I am not aware of an ANSI/VT
animation of the Northern and/or Southern hemisphere, I would not be
surprised if someone has already done it (It is an obvious topic to pick,
isn't it?). 

However, the above "ascii Virtual Reality" in conjunction with the web
does allow you "to turn your head sideways and up and down", something
that ANSI/VT animation techniques do *not* offer.

I myself am not interested in pursuing these ideas further, but others
might.

---------------------------------------------------------------
     ,,        _  Grandpa Devilstein! Shame on you!
    ( ">     <" )   Singing and dancing at that orgy web site
   ,(->)->   <( <)    where your tail is pointing to!
  (  ^^        ^^
    ` - >>> http://members.aol.com/petecasso
---------------------------------------------------------------

Pete Casso (pet...@aol.com) wrote --

>         ....For example, my favorite email client is Claris Emailer, a Mac
> only program and may therefore not be very well known. It is IMO far
> superior than the ubiquitous Eudora (available for Mac and Windows), but
> the editor does linewrap at 75 characters.

I just received an e-mail message with the following in the header:

> x-mailer: Claris Emailer 1.1

The body contained a single long paragraph -- completely unwrapped.

Dan Strychalski
dsk...@cameonet.cameo.com.tw

>> x-mailer: Claris Emailer 1.1
>The body contained a single long paragraph -- completely unwrapped.

I checked my version of Claris Emailer, it is version 1.0v3, so that may
be the explanation or part of the explanation. The linewrap issue (for
email purposes, not for ascii art) is also discussed in the manual (yes, I
did pay for my copy).

Considering that some of the other clients also start linewrapping at 75
characters, I would stay away with a margin of a couple of characters, in
my previous post I suggested 72 characters as a safe width.
---------------------------------------------------------------
     ,,        _  Grandpa Devilstein! Shame on you!
    ( ">     <" )   Singing and dancing at that orgy web site
   ,(->)->   <( <)    where your tail is pointing to!
  (  ^^        ^^
    ` - >>> http://members.aol.com/petecasso
---------------------------------------------------------------

Pete Casso (pet...@aol.com) wrote --

> Considering that some of the other clients also start linewrapping at 75
> characters, I would stay away with a margin of a couple of characters, in
> my previous post I suggested 72 characters as a safe width.

Whatever the case, people *must* wrap text messages before 80 characters
and *should* wrap them before 74 characters. Eighty-column text-only
displays are still very common.

The statement "clients... [he means mail and news programs, folks] start
linewrapping at 75 characters" is strange. Admittedly, I don't know
what's out there; all I have for Internet stuff are Unix programs. All
the programs I've seen let me select any editor I want to handle text,
and I can't imagine an editor that wraps received messages or that won't
let me set the maximum number of characters per line in outgoing
messages. Are you saying that some programs wrap *received* material, or
that some have a fixed maximum width? Any such program, IMO, is garbage.

Not that I would dispute a recommendation to keep material to 72 columns.
When required, though -- especially for ASCII art -- I say "take it to
the limit": 79 columns if necessary (but sign your work so "> " quoting
is unnecessary; who wants "> " on every line of their work?), or more if
really, really required -- but INCLUDE A WARNING and EXPLAIN YOUR
REASONS.

I ordinarily *detest* anything that goes to 80 characters or more per
line. But I have one ASCII-art file that goes to 126 characters. The
artist provides a warning and an explanation at the beginning; because of
this, and because of the quality of the art, I would not complain if he
had made it even wider than that.

Dan Strychalski
dsk...@cameonet.cameo.com.tw

pet...@aol.com (PeteCasso):
petecassostein> In the FAQ ... there is a line towards the end
petecassostein> saying something like "76 characters to avoid
petecassostein> linewrap" and I would like to comment on that.
petecassostein> [...] some NNTP clients seem to linewrap at 75
petecassostein> characters or below that.  [...]
petecassostein> I believe that the FAQ is inaccurate.
petecassostein> How many characters per line?

No line width is ever safe from SuperciteStein and AutowrapStein, Pete.

QuoteStein

mnu...@ma.ultranet.com (Michael Nute):
> There are some of us whose eyes are not quite so good.
> I prefer to use a font size of 10, to avoid squinting.

Some eyes even need a font size of 42 which allows for about two characters
per line and a dozen quotations with an indent prefix of !$&#.

> I *can't stand* scrolling sideways.
> I set my wordwrap at 72 to avoid this.

Some people just instruct the program they use for reading text
to wordwrap at the margin.  And some toggle this when required.

Btw, thank you for quoting everything - it makes reading much more fun.  NOT!

Next on alt.ascii-art :  Which character to use for people without monitors.

Sven

dsk...@cameonet.cameo.com.tw meinte am 16.03.97
zum Thema "Re: Linewrap and more!":

d> I just received an e-mail message with the following in the header:
d>
d> > x-mailer: Claris Emailer 1.1
d>
d> The body contained a single long paragraph -- completely unwrapped.

Does the MAc use CR/LF combinations to end lines, or just CR or LF
alone? The latter cases won't break lines properly on DOS machines,
AFAIK...

Ciao
  Bernd
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
This line intentionally left blank
## CrossPoint v3.1 ##

>QuoteStein
I expected Svenstein Guckestein!
In any case, all of my fans are free to add the suffix "stein" to their
first and/or last names!
---------------------------------------------------------------
     ,,        _  Grandpa Devilstein! Shame on you!
    ( ">     <" )   Singing and dancing at that orgy web site
   ,(->)->   <( <)    where your tail is pointing to!
  (  ^^        ^^
    ` - >>> http://members.aol.com/petecasso
---------------------------------------------------------------

Well, the thing is that many users (the vast majority of users?) never
change their linewrap parameters (and other text display parameters, for
that matter). They always use the default values in their email and
newsgroup programs (for both send and receive). 

The field data that I posted in my original article reflects these default
values, with the result that 75 characters does get linewrapped in some
cases, the reason for me to denote it not a safe width. Not enough field
data for 74 and 73 characters, and hence a grey area in my experience. And
finally, 72 characters is a safe width according to field data sofar.

Or to say things somewhat differently, if we want to cater to a typical
user like the one described in the first paragraph, we will need to live
with the constraints described in the second paragraph.
---------------------------------------------------------------
     ,,        _  Grandpa Devilstein! Shame on you!
    ( ">     <" )   Singing and dancing at that orgy web site
   ,(->)->   <( <)    where your tail is pointing to!
  (  ^^        ^^
    ` - >>> http://members.aol.com/petecasso
---------------------------------------------------------------

Bernd Wolff (bwo...@newswire.de) asked --

> Does the MAc use CR/LF combinations to end lines, or just CR or LF
> alone? The latter cases won't break lines properly on DOS machines,
> AFAIK...

Just CR. But the message I referred to, and every other message I've
received from anyone with a Mac, had LF only, as is proper on the
Internet (though I think HTML files are supposed to be CR-LF).

I've gotten CR-LF in e-mail only once. The sender used a W-----s
program called Chameleon, if I remember correctly.

Dan Strychalski
dsk...@cameonet.cameo.com.tw

dsk...@cameonet.cameo.com.tw (dsk...@cameonet.cameo.com.tw):
> I correspond frequently with several people who don't use
> -- or need -- monitors. Take a wild guess why they don't.
> Dan Strychalski dsk...@cameonet.cameo.com.tw

Thank you for providing an answer, too.

Sven

Sven Guckes (guc...@banach.math.fu-berlin.de) wrote --

> Next on alt.ascii-art :  Which character to use for people without monitors.

I'm waiting. I correspond frequently with several people who don't
use -- or need -- monitors. Take a wild guess why they don't.

Dan Strychalski
dsk...@cameonet.cameo.com.tw

Bernd Wolff (bwo...@newswire.de) asked --

> Does the MAc use CR/LF combinations to end lines, or just CR or LF
> alone? The latter cases won't break lines properly on DOS machines,
> AFAIK...

Just CR. But the message I referred to, and every other message I've
received from anyone with a Mac, had LF only, as is proper on the
Internet (though I think HTML files are supposed to be CR-LF).

I've gotten CR-LF in e-mail only once. The sender used a W-----s
program called Chameleon, if I remember correctly.

Dan Strychalski
dsk...@cameonet.cameo.com.tw

>QuoteStein
I expected Svenstein Guckestein!
In any case, all of my fans are free to add the suffix "stein" to their
first and/or last names!
---------------------------------------------------------------
     ,,        _  Grandpa Devilstein! Shame on you!
    ( ">     <" )   Singing and dancing at that orgy web site
   ,(->)->   <( <)    where your tail is pointing to!
  (  ^^        ^^
    ` - >>> http://members.aol.com/petecasso
---------------------------------------------------------------

Well, the thing is that many users (the vast majority of users?) never
change their linewrap parameters (and other text display parameters, for
that matter). They always use the default values in their email and
newsgroup programs (for both send and receive). 

The field data that I posted in my original article reflects these default
values, with the result that 75 characters does get linewrapped in some
cases, the reason for me to denote it not a safe width. Not enough field
data for 74 and 73 characters, and hence a grey area in my experience. And
finally, 72 characters is a safe width according to field data sofar.

Or to say things somewhat differently, if we want to cater to a typical
user like the one described in the first paragraph, we will need to live
with the constraints described in the second paragraph.
---------------------------------------------------------------
     ,,        _  Grandpa Devilstein! Shame on you!
    ( ">     <" )   Singing and dancing at that orgy web site
   ,(->)->   <( <)    where your tail is pointing to!
  (  ^^        ^^
    ` - >>> http://members.aol.com/petecasso
---------------------------------------------------------------

dsk...@cameonet.cameo.com.tw meinte am 16.03.97
zum Thema "Re: Linewrap and more!":

d> I just received an e-mail message with the following in the header:
d>
d> > x-mailer: Claris Emailer 1.1
d>
d> The body contained a single long paragraph -- completely unwrapped.

Does the MAc use CR/LF combinations to end lines, or just CR or LF
alone? The latter cases won't break lines properly on DOS machines,
AFAIK...

Ciao
  Bernd
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
This line intentionally left blank
## CrossPoint v3.1 ##

Sven Guckes (guc...@banach.math.fu-berlin.de) wrote --

> Next on alt.ascii-art :  Which character to use for people without monitors.

I'm waiting. I correspond frequently with several people who don't
use -- or need -- monitors. Take a wild guess why they don't.

Dan Strychalski
dsk...@cameonet.cameo.com.tw