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Re: CR or LF? [message #393519 is a reply to message #393517] Sat, 18 April 2020 07:02 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Ahem A Rivet's Shot is currently offline  Ahem A Rivet's Shot
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On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 12:08:23 +0200
"Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:

> On 18/04/2020 09.44, Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote:
>> On Tue, 14 Apr 2020 05:24:53 +0200
>> "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
>>
>>> You are confusing the behaviour of complex printer drivers with plain
>>> simple text printers (with no drivers).
>>
>> Plain simple text printers usually do have drivers, they're just
>> very simple and support an extremely wide range of printers. They can
>> usually be configured to handle CR/LF/CRLF translations as well as
>> inserting NULs and/or delays to accommodate hardware restrictions. The
>> unix tty driver is a good example.
>
> I used my 9 pin printers in MsDOS directly, file copy to printer port.
> No driver at all. Worked perfectly. :-)

There's a driver, it's built into MSDOS, it drives the printer port,
I don't think it can do any conversions BICBW it's been a long time since
MSDOS.

> I have done the same from unix, but via rs232 port. Had to flip a switch
> in the printer to handle cr/lf.

The unix tty driver is quite capable of handling the cr/lf
conversions (and a great deal more) - see man stty for details. You could
have configured the driver instead of flipping the switch.

Just because it isn't model specific doesn't mean it isn't a
driver, all devices have drivers.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith | Directable Mirror Arrays
C:\>WIN | A better way to focus the sun
The computer obeys and wins. | licences available see
You lose and Bill collects. | http://www.sohara.org/
Re: CR or LF? [message #393531 is a reply to message #393513] Sat, 18 April 2020 14:33 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Peter Flass is currently offline  Peter Flass
Messages: 8375
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Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> wrote:
> On Tue, 14 Apr 2020 06:29:25 -0700
> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> Bob Eager <news0073@eager.cx> wrote:
>>> On Mon, 13 Apr 2020 17:29:53 -0700, Peter Flass wrote:
>>>
>
>>>> Besides, thinking about this, what’s the distinction between a two-byte
>>>> count field and a two-byte (CRLF) delimiter?
>>>
>>> The latter can handle a line of any length.
>>>
>>
>> Do you want a 16,000 character line?
>
> They happen in systems that use line delimiters therefore some
> people want them. The most common cases are serialised structured data and
> marked up text where lines are not significant in the application.

If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
something.

> Arguably
> neither are text but rather data in a text encoding which works as a way of
> storing text too.
>



--
Pete
Re: CR or LF? [message #393534 is a reply to message #393531] Sat, 18 April 2020 15:11 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Charlie Gibbs is currently offline  Charlie Gibbs
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On 2020-04-18, Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:

> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> wrote:
>
>> On Tue, 14 Apr 2020 06:29:25 -0700
>> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Bob Eager <news0073@eager.cx> wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Mon, 13 Apr 2020 17:29:53 -0700, Peter Flass wrote:
>>>>
>>>> > Besides, thinking about this, what’s the distinction between a two-byte
>>>> > count field and a two-byte (CRLF) delimiter?
>>>>
>>>> The latter can handle a line of any length.
>>>
>>> Do you want a 16,000 character line?
>>
>> They happen in systems that use line delimiters therefore some
>> people want them. The most common cases are serialised structured data and
>> marked up text where lines are not significant in the application.
>
> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
> something.

I've seen HTML and XML files with no line delimiters at all.
I suspect that whoever created them wants them to be write-only.
(I wrote a routine to insert line breaks so I could easily read them
to figure out what they're up to or to glean useful information.)

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | Microsoft is a dictatorship.
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | Apple is a cult.
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | Linux is anarchy.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | Pick your poison.
Re: CR or LF? [message #393537 is a reply to message #393519] Sat, 18 April 2020 15:50 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Carlos E.R.

On 18/04/2020 13.02, Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote:
> On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 12:08:23 +0200
> "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
>
>> On 18/04/2020 09.44, Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote:
>>> On Tue, 14 Apr 2020 05:24:53 +0200
>>> "Carlos E.R." <robin_listas@es.invalid> wrote:
>>>
>>>> You are confusing the behaviour of complex printer drivers with plain
>>>> simple text printers (with no drivers).
>>>
>>> Plain simple text printers usually do have drivers, they're just
>>> very simple and support an extremely wide range of printers. They can
>>> usually be configured to handle CR/LF/CRLF translations as well as
>>> inserting NULs and/or delays to accommodate hardware restrictions. The
>>> unix tty driver is a good example.
>>
>> I used my 9 pin printers in MsDOS directly, file copy to printer port.
>> No driver at all. Worked perfectly. :-)
>
> There's a driver, it's built into MSDOS, it drives the printer port,
> I don't think it can do any conversions BICBW it's been a long time since
> MSDOS.

I don't call that "a driver".

I also printed from my own code handling directly the port chip. In any
case, I assure you there was no modification of the stream the code
sends and what the printer gets, byte by byte.

I could use a library, that simply allowed me to send a string to the
printer and not having to care about the gore details of the assembler
code that handled the chip. This could be called "driver" at the time,
but did no translation at all. It just took a byte, wrote it to the
output port when ready, detected when the port was ready for the next
char, and sent it, till buffer was empty.

Any conversion had to be done by your program code. Like a font change.
Writing a graphic was very entertaining.

>
>> I have done the same from unix, but via rs232 port. Had to flip a switch
>> in the printer to handle cr/lf.
>
> The unix tty driver is quite capable of handling the cr/lf
> conversions (and a great deal more) - see man stty for details. You could
> have configured the driver instead of flipping the switch.

Ha! It was far easier to flip a switch (including reading the manual)
than finding if it was possible to do the equivalent in that unix
machine. Even support said to configure the printer.


> Just because it isn't model specific doesn't mean it isn't a
> driver, all devices have drivers.
>


--
Cheers, Carlos.
Re: CR or LF? [message #393539 is a reply to message #393531] Sat, 18 April 2020 16:03 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
Messages: 4237
Registered: February 2012
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Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> writes:
> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> wrote:

>>
>> They happen in systems that use line delimiters therefore some
>> people want them. The most common cases are serialised structured data and
>> marked up text where lines are not significant in the application.
>
> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
> something.

That's what editors and other tools are for. Why waste the disk space
when a 200MB disk is incredibly expensive? Burroughs had DMPALL,
Unix had od (and more recently, vim comes with xxd) or 'cat -v', etc.
Re: CR or LF? [message #393542 is a reply to message #393531] Sat, 18 April 2020 17:44 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Ahem A Rivet's Shot is currently offline  Ahem A Rivet's Shot
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On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 11:33:31 -0700
Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:

> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> wrote:

>> They happen in systems that use line delimiters therefore some
>> people want them. The most common cases are serialised structured data
>> and marked up text where lines are not significant in the application.
>
> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
> something.

Why waste the space storing or transmitting newlines, you can
always use a pretty-printer to view the data if you want to, especially
since you'll almost certainly want indentation as well as newlines to make
it comfortably readable.

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith | Directable Mirror Arrays
C:\>WIN | A better way to focus the sun
The computer obeys and wins. | licences available see
You lose and Bill collects. | http://www.sohara.org/
Re: CR or LF? [message #393543 is a reply to message #393531] Sat, 18 April 2020 18:22 Go to previous messageGo to next message
John Levine is currently offline  John Levine
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In article <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
> something.

Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
on the fly.

--
Regards,
John Levine, johnl@taugh.com, Primary Perpetrator of "The Internet for Dummies",
Please consider the environment before reading this e-mail. https://jl.ly
Re: CR or LF? [message #393544 is a reply to message #393534] Sat, 18 April 2020 18:32 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Dan Espen is currently offline  Dan Espen
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Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> writes:

> On 2020-04-18, Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> wrote:
>>
>>> On Tue, 14 Apr 2020 06:29:25 -0700
>>> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Bob Eager <news0073@eager.cx> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> > On Mon, 13 Apr 2020 17:29:53 -0700, Peter Flass wrote:
>>>> >
>>>> >> Besides, thinking about this, what’s the distinction between a two-byte
>>>> >> count field and a two-byte (CRLF) delimiter?
>>>> >
>>>> > The latter can handle a line of any length.
>>>>
>>>> Do you want a 16,000 character line?
>>>
>>> They happen in systems that use line delimiters therefore some
>>> people want them. The most common cases are serialised structured data and
>>> marked up text where lines are not significant in the application.
>>
>> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>> something.
>
> I've seen HTML and XML files with no line delimiters at all.
> I suspect that whoever created them wants them to be write-only.
> (I wrote a routine to insert line breaks so I could easily read them
> to figure out what they're up to or to glean useful information.)

Yep, all those WhizzyWig html editors do that.
It's a shame, hand written HTML is much more fun.

--
Dan Espen
Re: CR or LF? [message #393545 is a reply to message #393543] Sat, 18 April 2020 18:55 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: J. Clarke

On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine
<johnl@taugh.com> wrote:

> In article <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>> something.
>
> Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
> we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
> on the fly.

I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm
using a 49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two
megapixel 21 inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass
market vendor a 75 inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has
to work on all of those, and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on
a tablet. This means that formatting has to be quite flexible.

And people who design web sites for a living generally don't type
HTML--they use applications such as DreamWeaver that let them do most
of the work graphically. For that matter many web sites aren't
actually written in HTML, they generate HTML on the fly.
re: CRLF [message #393547 is a reply to message #393545] Sat, 18 April 2020 21:03 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Peter Flass is currently offline  Peter Flass
Messages: 8375
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On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine <johnl@taugh.com>
wrote:
In article
<174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
something.
Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which we'll be
looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text on the fly.

I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm using a
49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two megapixel 21
inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass market vendor a 75
inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has to work on all of those,
and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on a tablet. This means that
formatting has to be quite flexible.

I don’t have anything that big, but I like to have a bunch of smaller
windows open rather than a really big one. I think it would be very hard to
read across a line of text several hundred characters long.

And people who design web sites for a living generally don't type
HTML--they use applications such as DreamWeaver that let them do most of
the work graphically. For that matter many web sites aren't actually
written in HTML, they generate HTML on the fly.

Which explains why so many websites are crap.

(sorry, I lost the indentations)



--
Pete
Re: CR or LF? [message #393550 is a reply to message #393534] Sat, 18 April 2020 21:55 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
Messages: 4237
Registered: February 2012
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Senior Member
Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> writes:
> On 2020-04-18, Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> wrote:
>>
>>> On Tue, 14 Apr 2020 06:29:25 -0700
>>> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Bob Eager <news0073@eager.cx> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> > On Mon, 13 Apr 2020 17:29:53 -0700, Peter Flass wrote:
>>>> >
>>>> >> Besides, thinking about this, what’s the distinction between a two-byte
>>>> >> count field and a two-byte (CRLF) delimiter?
>>>> >
>>>> > The latter can handle a line of any length.
>>>>
>>>> Do you want a 16,000 character line?
>>>
>>> They happen in systems that use line delimiters therefore some
>>> people want them. The most common cases are serialised structured data and
>>> marked up text where lines are not significant in the application.
>>
>> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>> something.
>
> I've seen HTML and XML files with no line delimiters at all.
> I suspect that whoever created them wants them to be write-only.
> (I wrote a routine to insert line breaks so I could easily read them
> to figure out what they're up to or to glean useful information.)

There are many XML pretty-printers out there that will make it
more readable (indenting nested tags, e.g.)
Re: CR or LF? [message #393557 is a reply to message #393542] Sun, 19 April 2020 04:46 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Jorgen Grahn is currently offline  Jorgen Grahn
Messages: 606
Registered: March 2012
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Senior Member
On Sat, 2020-04-18, Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote:
> On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 11:33:31 -0700
> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> wrote:
>
>>> They happen in systems that use line delimiters therefore some
>>> people want them. The most common cases are serialised structured data
>>> and marked up text where lines are not significant in the application.
>>
>> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>> something.
>
> Why waste the space storing or transmitting newlines, you can
> always use a pretty-printer to view the data if you want to, especially
> since you'll almost certainly want indentation as well as newlines to make
> it comfortably readable.

If it doesn't need to be readable without tools, you might as well
format it properly and then gzip it. That would be a far bigger
saving (for typical XML, anyway).

/Jorgen

--
// Jorgen Grahn <grahn@ Oo o. . .
\X/ snipabacken.se> O o .
Re: CR or LF? [message #393558 is a reply to message #393545] Sun, 19 April 2020 04:55 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Jorgen Grahn is currently offline  Jorgen Grahn
Messages: 606
Registered: March 2012
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Senior Member
On Sat, 2020-04-18, J Clarke wrote:
> On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine
> <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
>
>> In article <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
>> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>>> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>>> something.
>>
>> Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
>> we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
>> on the fly.
>
> I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
> stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm
> using a 49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two
> megapixel 21 inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass
> market vendor a 75 inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has
> to work on all of those, and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on
> a tablet. This means that formatting has to be quite flexible.

It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
characters; computers can't fix that.

/Jorgen

--
// Jorgen Grahn <grahn@ Oo o. . .
\X/ snipabacken.se> O o .
Re: CR or LF? [message #393560 is a reply to message #393557] Sun, 19 April 2020 05:58 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Ahem A Rivet's Shot is currently offline  Ahem A Rivet's Shot
Messages: 4843
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On 19 Apr 2020 08:46:34 GMT
Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se> wrote:

> On Sat, 2020-04-18, Ahem A Rivet's Shot wrote:
>> On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 11:33:31 -0700
>> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Ahem A Rivet's Shot <steveo@eircom.net> wrote:
>>
>>>> They happen in systems that use line delimiters therefore
>>>> some people want them. The most common cases are serialised
>>>> structured data and marked up text where lines are not significant
>>>> in the application.
>>>
>>> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file
>>> will be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to
>>> debug something.
>>
>> Why waste the space storing or transmitting newlines, you can
>> always use a pretty-printer to view the data if you want to, especially
>> since you'll almost certainly want indentation as well as newlines to
>> make it comfortably readable.
>
> If it doesn't need to be readable without tools, you might as well
> format it properly and then gzip it. That would be a far bigger
> saving (for typical XML, anyway).

Sure if you want the processing overhead of compression and
decompression which for serialised data or RPC you usually don't!

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith | Directable Mirror Arrays
C:\>WIN | A better way to focus the sun
The computer obeys and wins. | licences available see
You lose and Bill collects. | http://www.sohara.org/
Re: CR or LF? [message #393563 is a reply to message #393558] Sun, 19 April 2020 08:16 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: J. Clarke

On 19 Apr 2020 08:55:31 GMT, Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se>
wrote:

> On Sat, 2020-04-18, J Clarke wrote:
>> On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine
>> <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
>>
>>> In article <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
>>> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>>>> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>>>> something.
>>>
>>> Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
>>> we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
>>> on the fly.
>>
>> I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
>> stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm
>> using a 49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two
>> megapixel 21 inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass
>> market vendor a 75 inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has
>> to work on all of those, and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on
>> a tablet. This means that formatting has to be quite flexible.
>
> It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
> characters; computers can't fix that.

Do you have research to support that statement?
>
> /Jorgen
Re: CR or LF? [message #393598 is a reply to message #393563] Sun, 19 April 2020 09:19 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Dan Espen is currently offline  Dan Espen
Messages: 3867
Registered: January 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> writes:

> On 19 Apr 2020 08:55:31 GMT, Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se>
> wrote:
>
>> On Sat, 2020-04-18, J Clarke wrote:
>>> On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine
>>> <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> In article <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
>>>> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>> >If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>>>> >be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>>>> >something.
>>>>
>>>> Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
>>>> we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
>>>> on the fly.
>>>
>>> I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
>>> stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm
>>> using a 49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two
>>> megapixel 21 inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass
>>> market vendor a 75 inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has
>>> to work on all of those, and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on
>>> a tablet. This means that formatting has to be quite flexible.
>>
>> It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
>> characters; computers can't fix that.
>
> Do you have research to support that statement?

Seems to me I do that "research" every time I try to read text on a wide
screen. Maybe you can do it, but for me after about 80-90 characters
it becomes hard to follow the line.

--
Dan Espen
Re: CR or LF? [message #393600 is a reply to message #393598] Sun, 19 April 2020 10:24 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: J. Clarke

On Sun, 19 Apr 2020 09:19:43 -0400, Dan Espen <dan1espen@gmail.com>
wrote:

> J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> On 19 Apr 2020 08:55:31 GMT, Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> On Sat, 2020-04-18, J Clarke wrote:
>>>> On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine
>>>> <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> >In article <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
>>>> >Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>> >>If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>>>> >>be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>>>> >>something.
>>>> >
>>>> >Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
>>>> >we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
>>>> >on the fly.
>>>>
>>>> I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
>>>> stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm
>>>> using a 49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two
>>>> megapixel 21 inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass
>>>> market vendor a 75 inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has
>>>> to work on all of those, and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on
>>>> a tablet. This means that formatting has to be quite flexible.
>>>
>>> It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
>>> characters; computers can't fix that.
>>
>> Do you have research to support that statement?
>
> Seems to me I do that "research" every time I try to read text on a wide
> screen. Maybe you can do it, but for me after about 80-90 characters
> it becomes hard to follow the line.

How about if the line is 80 characters with hardcoded line breaks, but
shortened to 60 characters?

For some purposes CR/LF is a paragraph break, not a line break. I
suspect that if they had had a crystal ball the early architects would
have included a "paragraph break" character, but we do the best we can
with what we have.
Re: CR or LF? [message #393602 is a reply to message #393598] Sun, 19 April 2020 10:54 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
Messages: 4237
Registered: February 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Dan Espen <dan1espen@gmail.com> writes:
> J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> On 19 Apr 2020 08:55:31 GMT, Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> On Sat, 2020-04-18, J Clarke wrote:
>>>> On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine
>>>> <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> >In article <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
>>>> >Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>> >>If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>>>> >>be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>>>> >>something.
>>>> >
>>>> >Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
>>>> >we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
>>>> >on the fly.
>>>>
>>>> I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
>>>> stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm
>>>> using a 49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two
>>>> megapixel 21 inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass
>>>> market vendor a 75 inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has
>>>> to work on all of those, and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on
>>>> a tablet. This means that formatting has to be quite flexible.
>>>
>>> It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
>>> characters; computers can't fix that.
>>
>> Do you have research to support that statement?
>
> Seems to me I do that "research" every time I try to read text on a wide
> screen. Maybe you can do it, but for me after about 80-90 characters
> it becomes hard to follow the line.

Greenbar screens? :-)
Re: CR or LF? [message #393609 is a reply to message #393602] Sun, 19 April 2020 12:19 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Dan Espen is currently offline  Dan Espen
Messages: 3867
Registered: January 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
scott@slp53.sl.home (Scott Lurndal) writes:

> Dan Espen <dan1espen@gmail.com> writes:
>> J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> writes:
>>
>>> On 19 Apr 2020 08:55:31 GMT, Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Sat, 2020-04-18, J Clarke wrote:
>>>> > On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine
>>>> > <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
>>>> >
>>>> >>In article <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
>>>> >>Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>> >>>If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>>>> >>>be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>>>> >>>something.
>>>> >>
>>>> >>Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
>>>> >>we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
>>>> >>on the fly.
>>>> >
>>>> > I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
>>>> > stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm
>>>> > using a 49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two
>>>> > megapixel 21 inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass
>>>> > market vendor a 75 inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has
>>>> > to work on all of those, and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on
>>>> > a tablet. This means that formatting has to be quite flexible.
>>>>
>>>> It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
>>>> characters; computers can't fix that.
>>>
>>> Do you have research to support that statement?
>>
>> Seems to me I do that "research" every time I try to read text on a wide
>> screen. Maybe you can do it, but for me after about 80-90 characters
>> it becomes hard to follow the line.
>
> Greenbar screens? :-)

Greenbar certainly helped scan those 132 or 144 character print lines.
I have a greenbar image I used as a tiled background when I wanted to show a
computer report sample.

--
Dan Espen
Re: CR or LF? [message #393611 is a reply to message #393563] Sun, 19 April 2020 12:26 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Quadibloc is currently offline  Quadibloc
Messages: 4399
Registered: June 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
On Sunday, April 19, 2020 at 6:16:47 AM UTC-6, J. Clarke wrote:
> On 19 Apr 2020 08:55:31 GMT, Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se>
> wrote:

>> It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
>> characters; computers can't fix that.

> Do you have research to support that statement?

I don't know about research, but typesetters have been, since time immemorial,
treating the ideal column width as one and a half alphabets, with widths of up
to two alphabets being acceptable.

And this is, of course, for easier-to-read proportionally-spaced text, rather
than monospaced typewritten text.

There is research on text legibility as well, one could do worse than to start
with _Typographical Printing Surfaces_ by Legros and Grant.

John Savard
Re: CR or LF? [message #393617 is a reply to message #393563] Sun, 19 April 2020 13:47 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Peter Flass is currently offline  Peter Flass
Messages: 8375
Registered: December 2011
Karma: 0
Senior Member
J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 19 Apr 2020 08:55:31 GMT, Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se>
> wrote:
>
>> On Sat, 2020-04-18, J Clarke wrote:
>>> On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine
>>> <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> In article
>>>> <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
>>>>
>>>> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>> > If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>>>> > be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>>>> > something.
>>>>
>>>> Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
>>>> we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
>>>> on the fly.
>>>
>>> I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
>>> stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm
>>> using a 49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two
>>> megapixel 21 inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass
>>> market vendor a 75 inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has
>>> to work on all of those, and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on
>>> a tablet. This means that formatting has to be quite flexible.
>>
>> It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
>> characters; computers can't fix that.
>
> Do you have research to support that statement?
>>
>> /Jorgen
>

I’m sure there is some. I’d like to see it. If i get time I’ll search.

--
Pete
Re: CR or LF? [message #393618 is a reply to message #393598] Sun, 19 April 2020 13:47 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Peter Flass is currently offline  Peter Flass
Messages: 8375
Registered: December 2011
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Dan Espen <dan1espen@gmail.com> wrote:
> J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> writes:
>
>> On 19 Apr 2020 08:55:31 GMT, Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> On Sat, 2020-04-18, J Clarke wrote:
>>>> On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine
>>>> <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> > In article
>>>> > <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
>>>> > Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>> >> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>>>> >> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>>>> >> something.
>>>> >
>>>> > Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
>>>> > we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
>>>> > on the fly.
>>>>
>>>> I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
>>>> stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm
>>>> using a 49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two
>>>> megapixel 21 inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass
>>>> market vendor a 75 inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has
>>>> to work on all of those, and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on
>>>> a tablet. This means that formatting has to be quite flexible.
>>>
>>> It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
>>> characters; computers can't fix that.
>>
>> Do you have research to support that statement?
>
> Seems to me I do that "research" every time I try to read text on a wide
> screen. Maybe you can do it, but for me after about 80-90 characters
> it becomes hard to follow the line.
>

+1

The IBM 3290 could do up to 160 in one mode, but it had nice features like
a horizontal underline that followed the cursor to mark the current line.
That and a nice block cursor would help you keep track of where you were.

--
Pete
Re: CR or LF? [message #393619 is a reply to message #393600] Sun, 19 April 2020 13:47 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Peter Flass is currently offline  Peter Flass
Messages: 8375
Registered: December 2011
Karma: 0
Senior Member
J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sun, 19 Apr 2020 09:19:43 -0400, Dan Espen <dan1espen@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> writes:
>>
>>> On 19 Apr 2020 08:55:31 GMT, Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Sat, 2020-04-18, J Clarke wrote:
>>>> > On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine
>>>> > <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
>>>> >
>>>> >> In article
>>>> >> <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
>>>> >> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>> >>> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>>>> >>> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>>>> >>> something.
>>>> >>
>>>> >> Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
>>>> >> we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
>>>> >> on the fly.
>>>> >
>>>> > I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
>>>> > stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm
>>>> > using a 49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two
>>>> > megapixel 21 inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass
>>>> > market vendor a 75 inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has
>>>> > to work on all of those, and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on
>>>> > a tablet. This means that formatting has to be quite flexible.
>>>>
>>>> It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
>>>> characters; computers can't fix that.
>>>
>>> Do you have research to support that statement?
>>
>> Seems to me I do that "research" every time I try to read text on a wide
>> screen. Maybe you can do it, but for me after about 80-90 characters
>> it becomes hard to follow the line.
>
> How about if the line is 80 characters with hardcoded line breaks, but
> shortened to 60 characters?
>
> For some purposes CR/LF is a paragraph break, not a line break. I
> suspect that if they had had a crystal ball the early architects would
> have included a "paragraph break" character, but we do the best we can
> with what we have.
>

We have GS, US, and RS characters that no one’s using.

--
Pete
Re: CR or LF? [message #393626 is a reply to message #393611] Mon, 20 April 2020 05:40 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Johann 'Myrkraverk' Oskarsson

On 20/04/2020 12:26 am, Quadibloc wrote:
> On Sunday, April 19, 2020 at 6:16:47 AM UTC-6, J. Clarke wrote:
>> On 19 Apr 2020 08:55:31 GMT, Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se>
>> wrote:
>
>>> It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
>>> characters; computers can't fix that.
>
>> Do you have research to support that statement?
>
> I don't know about research, but typesetters have been, since time immemorial,
> treating the ideal column width as one and a half alphabets, with widths of up
> to two alphabets being acceptable.
>
> And this is, of course, for easier-to-read proportionally-spaced text, rather
> than monospaced typewritten text.
>
> There is research on text legibility as well, one could do worse than to start
> with _Typographical Printing Surfaces_ by Legros and Grant.

I seem to recall research, or quoted research, that said 66 characters
per line was the ideal reading length. Right now I cannot recall the
context, so I don't know if fixed width or variable width was relevant
to that supposed research. I might have gotten it from Knuth's Digital
Typography, but I don't have that book here with me to check.

--
Johann | email: invalid -> com | www.myrkraverk.com/blog/
I'm not from the Internet, I just work there. | twitter: @myrkraverk
Re: CR or LF? [message #393636 is a reply to message #393619] Mon, 20 April 2020 12:02 Go to previous messageGo to next message
scott is currently offline  scott
Messages: 4237
Registered: February 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> writes:
> J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Sun, 19 Apr 2020 09:19:43 -0400, Dan Espen <dan1espen@gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> J. Clarke <jclarke.873638@gmail.com> writes:
>>>
>>>> On 19 Apr 2020 08:55:31 GMT, Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se>
>>>> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> > On Sat, 2020-04-18, J Clarke wrote:
>>>> >> On Sat, 18 Apr 2020 22:22:36 -0000 (UTC), John Levine
>>>> >> <johnl@taugh.com> wrote:
>>>> >>
>>>> >>> In article
>>>> >>> <174465144.608927440.165750.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org>,
>>>> >>> Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>> >>>> If line breaks are not significant, why not include them so the file will
>>>> >>>> be human-readable. Sometime you want to look at this stuff to debug
>>>> >>>> something.
>>>> >>>
>>>> >>> Because we don't know how big the screens or windows are on which
>>>> >>> we'll be looking at them. Computers are really good at wrapping text
>>>> >>> on the fly.
>>>> >>
>>>> >> I think that this is something that people who have managed somehow to
>>>> >> stick their mindset into the 80x25 mindset don't get. Right now I'm
>>>> >> using a 49 inch 8 megapixel display. At work I typically use two two
>>>> >> megapixel 21 inch displayes. And it is possible to buy from a mass
>>>> >> market vendor a 75 inch 16 megapixel display. The same web site has
>>>> >> to work on all of those, and on a cell phone, and on a laptop, and on
>>>> >> a tablet. This means that formatting has to be quite flexible.
>>>> >
>>>> > It's still a fact that it's hard to read text wider than 60--70
>>>> > characters; computers can't fix that.
>>>>
>>>> Do you have research to support that statement?
>>>
>>> Seems to me I do that "research" every time I try to read text on a wide
>>> screen. Maybe you can do it, but for me after about 80-90 characters
>>> it becomes hard to follow the line.
>>
>> How about if the line is 80 characters with hardcoded line breaks, but
>> shortened to 60 characters?
>>
>> For some purposes CR/LF is a paragraph break, not a line break. I
>> suspect that if they had had a crystal ball the early architects would
>> have included a "paragraph break" character, but we do the best we can
>> with what we have.
>>
>
> We have GS, US, and RS characters that no one’s using.
>

Burroughs systems still use them (to introduce fields in forms mode on
full-screen terminals (albeit emulated in modern days)).
Re: CR or LF? [message #393640 is a reply to message #393626] Mon, 20 April 2020 19:05 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: Fred Smith

On 2020-04-20, Johann 'Myrkraverk' Oskarsson <johann@myrkraverk.invalid> wrote:
>
> I seem to recall research, or quoted research, that said 66 characters
> per line was the ideal reading length. Right now I cannot recall the
> context, so I don't know if fixed width or variable width was relevant
> to that supposed research. I might have gotten it from Knuth's Digital
> Typography, but I don't have that book here with me to check.
>

Knuth's influence would explain why TeX/LaTeX has fairly narrow columns
in the default article class. And in \twocolumn mode. Looks great, easy
to read, but produces a lot of white space on the page.
Re: CR or LF? [message #393661 is a reply to message #393640] Tue, 21 April 2020 02:07 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Jorgen Grahn is currently offline  Jorgen Grahn
Messages: 606
Registered: March 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
On Mon, 2020-04-20, Fred Smith wrote:
> On 2020-04-20, Johann 'Myrkraverk' Oskarsson <johann@myrkraverk.invalid> wrote:
>>
>> I seem to recall research, or quoted research, that said 66 characters
>> per line was the ideal reading length. Right now I cannot recall the
>> context, so I don't know if fixed width or variable width was relevant
>> to that supposed research. I might have gotten it from Knuth's Digital
>> Typography, but I don't have that book here with me to check.
>>
>
> Knuth's influence would explain why TeX/LaTeX has fairly narrow columns
> in the default article class. And in \twocolumn mode.

Probably, but I think he was just applying existing best practices.

> Looks great, easy to read, but produces a lot of white space on the
> page.

That effect is bad enough on A4-sized paper; must be even worse on
Letter. Perhaps \twocolumn should be used more often.

/Jorgen

--
// Jorgen Grahn <grahn@ Oo o. . .
\X/ snipabacken.se> O o .
Re: CR or LF? [message #393710 is a reply to message #393661] Wed, 22 April 2020 15:08 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Rich Alderson is currently offline  Rich Alderson
Messages: 489
Registered: August 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se> writes:

> On Mon, 2020-04-20, Fred Smith wrote:

>> On 2020-04-20, Johann 'Myrkraverk' Oskarsson <johann@myrkraverk.invalid>
>> wrote:

>>> I seem to recall research, or quoted research, that said 66 characters
>>> per line was the ideal reading length. Right now I cannot recall the
>>> context, so I don't know if fixed width or variable width was relevant
>>> to that supposed research. I might have gotten it from Knuth's Digital
>>> Typography, but I don't have that book here with me to check.

>> Knuth's influence would explain why TeX/LaTeX has fairly narrow columns
>> in the default article class. And in \twocolumn mode.

> Probably, but I think he was just applying existing best practices.

>> Looks great, easy to read, but produces a lot of white space on the
>> page.

> That effect is bad enough on A4-sized paper; must be even worse on
> Letter. Perhaps \twocolumn should be used more often.

Knuth was writing in the context of scientific/mathematical literature, where
wide margins are the norm so that notes can be added by the reader.

--
Rich Alderson news@alderson.users.panix.com
Audendum est, et veritas investiganda; quam etiamsi non assequamur,
omnino tamen proprius, quam nunc sumus, ad eam perveniemus.
--Galen
Re: CR or LF? [message #393711 is a reply to message #393710] Wed, 22 April 2020 16:22 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Jorgen Grahn is currently offline  Jorgen Grahn
Messages: 606
Registered: March 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
On Wed, 2020-04-22, Rich Alderson wrote:
> Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se> writes:
>
>> On Mon, 2020-04-20, Fred Smith wrote:
>
>>> On 2020-04-20, Johann 'Myrkraverk' Oskarsson <johann@myrkraverk.invalid>
>>> wrote:
>
>>>> I seem to recall research, or quoted research, that said 66 characters
>>>> per line was the ideal reading length. Right now I cannot recall the
>>>> context, so I don't know if fixed width or variable width was relevant
>>>> to that supposed research. I might have gotten it from Knuth's Digital
>>>> Typography, but I don't have that book here with me to check.
>
>>> Knuth's influence would explain why TeX/LaTeX has fairly narrow columns
>>> in the default article class. And in \twocolumn mode.
>
>> Probably, but I think he was just applying existing best practices.
>
>>> Looks great, easy to read, but produces a lot of white space on the
>>> page.
>
>> That effect is bad enough on A4-sized paper; must be even worse on
>> Letter. Perhaps \twocolumn should be used more often.
>
> Knuth was writing in the context of scientific/mathematical literature, where
> wide margins are the norm so that notes can be added by the reader.

I picked up the closest piece of fiction I had handy (a 1952 SF
paperback) and counted a randomly selected line: 59 characters.

Also:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_length

/Jorgen

--
// Jorgen Grahn <grahn@ Oo o. . .
\X/ snipabacken.se> O o .
Re: CR or LF? [message #393720 is a reply to message #393710] Wed, 22 April 2020 19:40 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Dan Espen is currently offline  Dan Espen
Messages: 3867
Registered: January 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
Rich Alderson <news@alderson.users.panix.com> writes:

> Jorgen Grahn <grahn+nntp@snipabacken.se> writes:
>
>> On Mon, 2020-04-20, Fred Smith wrote:
>
>>> On 2020-04-20, Johann 'Myrkraverk' Oskarsson <johann@myrkraverk.invalid>
>>> wrote:
>
>>>> I seem to recall research, or quoted research, that said 66 characters
>>>> per line was the ideal reading length. Right now I cannot recall the
>>>> context, so I don't know if fixed width or variable width was relevant
>>>> to that supposed research. I might have gotten it from Knuth's Digital
>>>> Typography, but I don't have that book here with me to check.
>
>>> Knuth's influence would explain why TeX/LaTeX has fairly narrow columns
>>> in the default article class. And in \twocolumn mode.
>
>> Probably, but I think he was just applying existing best practices.
>
>>> Looks great, easy to read, but produces a lot of white space on the
>>> page.
>
>> That effect is bad enough on A4-sized paper; must be even worse on
>> Letter. Perhaps \twocolumn should be used more often.
>
> Knuth was writing in the context of scientific/mathematical literature, where
> wide margins are the norm so that notes can be added by the reader.

I was working on an installation guide. I took over writing the
documentation from the tech writers. I put everything I could in the
help screens and massively simplified the process so the installation
guide went from book sized to pamphlet sized. The tech writers wanted
their job back and they claimed their first improvement was going to be
adding white space to the document.

I managed to pull a few levers and remove the tech writers from the
project.

Most us learn not to write in the margins early in our education.

Can you tell I'm not a fan of white space?

--
Dan Espen
Re: CR or LF? [message #393732 is a reply to message #393710] Thu, 23 April 2020 02:23 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Quadibloc is currently offline  Quadibloc
Messages: 4399
Registered: June 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
On Wednesday, April 22, 2020 at 1:08:20 PM UTC-6, Rich Alderson wrote:

> Knuth was writing in the context of scientific/mathematical literature, where
> wide margins are the norm so that notes can be added by the reader.

The scientific community learned its lession after Fermat's last theorem?

John Savard
Re: CR or LF? [message #393736 is a reply to message #393732] Thu, 23 April 2020 06:01 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Robin Vowels is currently offline  Robin Vowels
Messages: 426
Registered: July 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
On Thursday, April 23, 2020 at 4:23:37 PM UTC+10, Quadibloc wrote:
> On Wednesday, April 22, 2020 at 1:08:20 PM UTC-6, Rich Alderson wrote:
>
>> Knuth was writing in the context of scientific/mathematical literature, where
>> wide margins are the norm so that notes can be added by the reader.
>
> The scientific community learned its lession after Fermat's last theorem?

There was a need for wider margins!

Had there not been wide margins, we would not have
seen this printed statement
"The nuns have been violating their cows."
and its penned response:
"Better send them a Papal Bull."
Re: CR or LF? [message #393959 is a reply to message #393619] Tue, 05 May 2020 10:32 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Jan van den Broek is currently offline  Jan van den Broek
Messages: 70
Registered: April 2012
Karma: 0
Member
Sun, 19 Apr 2020 10:47:48 -0700
Peter Flass <peter_flass@yahoo.com> schrieb:

[Schnipp]

> We have GS, US, and RS characters that no one???s using.

I've used them (about ten years ago) and there's a reasonable change
that this is still running.
--
Jan v/d Broek balglaas@xs4all.nl

"And all those exclamation marks, you notice? Five? A sure
sign of someone who wears his underpants on his head."
Terry Pratchett -- "Maskerade"
Re: CR or LF? [message #394824 is a reply to message #393467] Fri, 22 May 2020 20:09 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: fred_weigel

On Tuesday, April 14, 2020 at 12:37:41 PM UTC-4, Gareth Evans wrote:
> On 14/04/2020 16:27, Scott wrote:
>> On Tue, 14 Apr 2020 11:38:24 +0100, Gareth Evans
>> <headstone255@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>>> On 14/04/2020 08:45, Bob Eager wrote:
>>>> On Mon, 13 Apr 2020 17:29:53 -0700, Peter Flass wrote:
>>>>
>>>> > Besides, thinking about this, what’s the distinction between a two-byte
>>>> > count field and a two-byte (CRLF) delimiter?
>>>>
>>>> The latter can handle a line of any length.
>>>
>>>
>>> I have yet to encounter a line of any length that exceeds
>>> 65,535 characters! :-)
>>
>> Physically, no, of course. On disk? Yes.
>>
>> It wasn't that long ago that I laid out the basic structure of an
>> image processing suite. I decided that the value of a few bytes of
>> memory exceeded the value of handling images larger than 64k pixels
>> square. Ridiculous. I could not foresee any such thing ever being
>> useful. Fast forward a few decades and, well...that was dumb, wasn't
>> it?
>>
>
> images are not ASCII text with end of line markers.

Oddly, Gareth, a lot of images are exactly that. When base64 encoded,
or otherwise transmitted. Its only when interpreted by a web browser
that they become... images.

FredW
Re: CR or LF? [message #394840 is a reply to message #394824] Sat, 23 May 2020 06:37 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Quadibloc is currently offline  Quadibloc
Messages: 4399
Registered: June 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
On Friday, May 22, 2020 at 6:09:21 PM UTC-6, fred_...@hotmail.com wrote:
> On Tuesday, April 14, 2020 at 12:37:41 PM UTC-4, Gareth Evans wrote:

>> images are not ASCII text with end of line markers.

> Oddly, Gareth, a lot of images are exactly that. When base64 encoded,
> or otherwise transmitted. Its only when interpreted by a web browser
> that they become... images.

The point is that neither the JPEG nor GIF image formats consist of ASCII text
with end of line markers. An image on the hard disk of a computer is what an
image is. What transmission formats are used by the HTML and WWW has nothing to
do with what images "are".

Of course, converting binaries to a format which transmits only 6 bits per
character is a huge waste of bandwidth, which shows that there is room for
improvement in those protocols. Instead of expanding binaries by over 33%, it
should be possible to limit the expansion to less than 2%.

John Savard
Re: CR or LF? [message #394841 is a reply to message #393511] Sat, 23 May 2020 06:40 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Quadibloc is currently offline  Quadibloc
Messages: 4399
Registered: June 2012
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Senior Member
On Friday, April 17, 2020 at 9:40:07 PM UTC-6, Questor wrote:
> In the days when I
> was slinging code on PDP10s, it was common practice for programs to accept CR,
> LF, CRLF, VT, FF, and ESC as signifying the end of a user's line of input.

That is so strange. Whatever the operating system may accept as signifying the end
of a user's line of input, by the time that line of input gets to an applications
program, the operating system should signal the end of that line in one and only
one unique way - and so programs would handle exactly that way and no other to
work properly.

John Savard
Re: CR or LF? [message #394844 is a reply to message #394840] Sat, 23 May 2020 08:36 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: J. Clarke

On Sat, 23 May 2020 03:37:47 -0700 (PDT), Quadibloc
<jsavard@ecn.ab.ca> wrote:

> On Friday, May 22, 2020 at 6:09:21 PM UTC-6, fred_...@hotmail.com wrote:
>> On Tuesday, April 14, 2020 at 12:37:41 PM UTC-4, Gareth Evans wrote:
>
>>> images are not ASCII text with end of line markers.
>
>> Oddly, Gareth, a lot of images are exactly that. When base64 encoded,
>> or otherwise transmitted. Its only when interpreted by a web browser
>> that they become... images.
>
> The point is that neither the JPEG nor GIF image formats consist of ASCII text
> with end of line markers. An image on the hard disk of a computer is what an
> image is. What transmission formats are used by the HTML and WWW has nothing to
> do with what images "are".

One could argue that a computer program stored in a ZIP file does not
consiste of ASCII text with end of line markers, because in the ZIP
file it has been compressed. JPEG and GIF are both compressed
formats.

> Of course, converting binaries to a format which transmits only 6 bits per
> character is a huge waste of bandwidth, which shows that there is room for
> improvement in those protocols. Instead of expanding binaries by over 33%, it
> should be possible to limit the expansion to less than 2%.
>
> John Savard
Re: CR or LF? [message #394845 is a reply to message #394840] Sat, 23 May 2020 08:38 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Robin Vowels is currently offline  Robin Vowels
Messages: 426
Registered: July 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
On Saturday, May 23, 2020 at 8:37:48 PM UTC+10, Quadibloc wrote:
> On Friday, May 22, 2020 at 6:09:21 PM UTC-6, f..._...@hotmail.com wrote:
>> On Tuesday, April 14, 2020 at 12:37:41 PM UTC-4, Gareth Evans wrote:
>
>>> images are not ASCII text with end of line markers.
>
>> Oddly, Gareth, a lot of images are exactly that. When base64 encoded,
>> or otherwise transmitted. Its only when interpreted by a web browser
>> that they become... images.
>
> The point is that neither the JPEG nor GIF image

nor TIFF nor PCX nor pretty all of the image formats

> formats consist of ASCII text
> with end of line markers. An image on the hard disk of a computer is what an
> image is. What transmission formats are used by the HTML and WWW has nothing to
> do with what images "are".
>
> Of course, converting binaries to a format which transmits only 6 bits per
> character is a huge waste of bandwidth, which shows that there is room for
> improvement in those protocols. Instead of expanding binaries by over 33%, it
> should be possible to limit the expansion to less than 2%.
>
> John Savard
Re: CR or LF? [message #394846 is a reply to message #394841] Sat, 23 May 2020 08:38 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Anonymous
Karma:
Originally posted by: J. Clarke

On Sat, 23 May 2020 03:40:25 -0700 (PDT), Quadibloc
<jsavard@ecn.ab.ca> wrote:

> On Friday, April 17, 2020 at 9:40:07 PM UTC-6, Questor wrote:
>> In the days when I
>> was slinging code on PDP10s, it was common practice for programs to accept CR,
>> LF, CRLF, VT, FF, and ESC as signifying the end of a user's line of input.
>
> That is so strange. Whatever the operating system may accept as signifying the end
> of a user's line of input, by the time that line of input gets to an applications
> program, the operating system should signal the end of that line in one and only
> one unique way - and so programs would handle exactly that way and no other to
> work properly.

Why is that the responsibility of the operating system? All it is
obligated to do is furnish bytes until the end of data has been
reached. If it starts changing characters it can make a huge mess.
Re: CR or LF? [message #394850 is a reply to message #394845] Sat, 23 May 2020 08:58 Go to previous messageGo to previous message
Dan Espen is currently offline  Dan Espen
Messages: 3867
Registered: January 2012
Karma: 0
Senior Member
robin.vowels@gmail.com writes:

> On Saturday, May 23, 2020 at 8:37:48 PM UTC+10, Quadibloc wrote:
>> On Friday, May 22, 2020 at 6:09:21 PM UTC-6, f..._...@hotmail.com wrote:
>>> On Tuesday, April 14, 2020 at 12:37:41 PM UTC-4, Gareth Evans wrote:
>>
>>>> images are not ASCII text with end of line markers.
>>
>>> Oddly, Gareth, a lot of images are exactly that. When base64 encoded,
>>> or otherwise transmitted. Its only when interpreted by a web browser
>>> that they become... images.
>>
>> The point is that neither the JPEG nor GIF image
>
> nor TIFF nor PCX nor pretty all of the image formats

2 notable exceptions, XPM and SVG, both are text.

SVG is interesting because it doesn't necessarily contain a bit mapped
image, it can contain vectors, shapes, text.

--
Dan Espen
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