Pixel to Em conversion...

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Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

On May 30, 12:49 pm, Maxx Pollare wrote:
> I'm in the process of creating some new CSS for my site (same as email)
> and wanted to try something other then pixles for everything...
>
> Unfortunately I couldn't get Google to give me a simple page that gives
> me a relationship between Em and Pixels, as in "What the hell is an Em,
> and how big is it in pixels?". So far I've scraped the experimental CSS
> layouts twice because I can't things to work right with Em...
>
> I am still learning all this CSS stuff, and for now most of my HTML is
> either written in Notepad+ (XP) or gEdit (Ubuntu). I plan on learing
> PHP next, once I've pick up some good books on it, and after I'm
> finishing this HTML 4.01/CSS 2.1 stuff...
>
> Note: I do not care about IE 5x or Netscape 4 until I reistall 98se on
> a junker box... Which will probally be never...
>
1em is equivalent to 100%. I hope that helps a bit. Working with CSS
is a different mind set to udeing the old tables for layout, although
tables are easier for some things, mainly laying out for and other
items that you need in a grid type structure.
Use "%" if it's easier to work with.
--
Regards Chad. http://freewebdesign.awardspace.biz

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

On May 30, 3:49 am, Maxx Pollare wrote:
> I'm in the process of creating some new CSS for my site (same as email)
> and wanted to try something other then pixles for everything...
>
> Unfortunately I couldn't get Google to give me a simple page that gives
> me a relationship between Em and Pixels, as in "What the hell is an Em,
> and how big is it in pixels?". So far I've scraped the experimental CSS
> layouts twice because I can't things to work right with Em...

An em is the font height (or the font height of the parent element
when you are specifying the font-size).

Since this eventually means you are describing something as a ratio of
the font size of the parent element of html, this means that you are
describing things as a ratio of whatever font size the user as
selected as their preference.

Since you don't know what the user's preference is, you can't convert
from pixels to ems or the other way. If you could, then there would be
no point in using ems instead of pixels.

Just keep your body text (i.e. the main text) at 100% (trusting that
the user has their preference set to something comfortable to read
(and the browser defaults before changing are good for most people -
vendors have done a fair bit of usability testing) and adjust up and
down for headings, small print and similar.

--
David Dorward
http://dorward.me.uk/
http://blog.dorward.me.uk/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Maxx Pollare wrote:
>
> Unfortunately I couldn't get Google to give me a simple page that gives
> me a relationship between Em and Pixels, as in "What the hell is an Em,
> and how big is it in pixels?". So far I've scraped the experimental CSS
> layouts twice because I can't things to work right with Em...
>
The default setting for browsers is 1 em = 16 pixels. The user has the
option to change that value to suit their preference.
Normally you would set font-size:100% for and adjust the other
font sizes from there using per-cents or ems. There is really no need to
know the actual pixel setting for an em, it's all relative to the user's
preferred font size.

--
jmm (hyphen) list (at) sohnen-moe (dot) com
(Remove .AXSPAMGN for email)

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

On 2007-05-30, David Dorward wrote:
> On May 30, 3:49 am, Maxx Pollare wrote:
>> I'm in the process of creating some new CSS for my site (same as email)
>> and wanted to try something other then pixles for everything...
>>
>> Unfortunately I couldn't get Google to give me a simple page that gives
>> me a relationship between Em and Pixels, as in "What the hell is an Em,
>> and how big is it in pixels?". So far I've scraped the experimental CSS
>> layouts twice because I can't things to work right with Em...
>
> An em is the font height (or the font height of the parent element
> when you are specifying the font-size).

Technically it's a measure of width (of an 'M') rather than of height.
An ex is supposed to be a measure of height (of an 'x'), but most
browsers don't bother to get exes exactly right.

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

On Wed, 30 May 2007 02:49:40 GMT Maxx Pollare scribed:

> I'm in the process of creating some new CSS for my site (same as email)
> and wanted to try something other then pixles for everything...
>
> Unfortunately I couldn't get Google to give me a simple page that gives
> me a relationship between Em and Pixels, as in "What the hell is an Em,
> and how big is it in pixels?". So far I've scraped the experimental CSS
> layouts twice because I can't things to work right with Em...
>
> I am still learning all this CSS stuff

1 em is the current local font size. There is no consistent relationship
to pixels.

--
Neredbojias
He who laughs last sounds like an idiot.

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Scripsit Ben C:

>> An em is the font height (or the font height of the parent element
>> when you are specifying the font-size).
>
> Technically it's a measure of width (of an 'M') rather than of height.

No it isn't. This disinformation used to be regularly presented and refuted
in various newsgroups, but recently it has been more quiet. Anyway, if in
doubt,
a) check the CSS specifications
b) make a simple test:

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Ben C wrote:

> Technically it's a measure of width (of an 'M') rather than of height.

In traditional typography, yes. But the modern definition of an 'em' is
that an em is the same as the font height.

The font height itself is quite a wishy-washy concept, but it can normally
be thought of as the height of most capital letters and lower-case letters
with ascenders (e.g. 'b', 'd', 'f', etc.). However, in certain fonts, some
of these letters may be smaller or taller than the font-height.

The CSS spec says that browsers are supposed to use the 1 em = font height
definition. So when using, say, a 13 px font, 1 em is supposed to be 13 px,
and doesn't depend at all on the width of the capital M, which could be
slightly larger or smaller than 13 px. The font may not even *have* a
capital letter M -- it may only have, say, Japanese Katakana characters
and no Western characters at all!

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
[Geek of HTML/SQL/Perl/PHP/Python/Apache/Linux]
[OS: Linux 2.6.12-12mdksmp, up 95 days, 17:14.]

Non-Intuitive Surnames
http://tobyinkster.co.uk/blog/2007/05/25/non-intuitive-surna mes/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

On 30 May, 03:49, Maxx Pollare wrote:

> "What the hell is an Em, and how big is it in pixels?".

There's no such relationship, and to even think that there is is a
major error in CSS design. Read the groups' archives, as this gets
discussed to death.

To convert from pixels to ems, then converting 12pixels to 1em won't
go far wrong.

1em is 100%, so you can use percentages if you prefer.

Then after you've done that, normalise all em settings so that nothing
is less than than 0.75em. Possibly unreadable legal boilerplate might
go to 0.67em, but that's hard to read and anything less is impossible.

Then go through and delete (nearly) all the em settings anyway. It's
just not necessary in competent web design to set this explicitly
(thinking it's appropriate to do is again a major error, as it betrays
that you don't realise how little the author controls and how much the
reader controls).

If you set
body { font-size:1em; font-size:100%; }
then that's enough for nearly all web pages. will be bigger, but
the default style sheet will probably take care of that adequately
anyway. Semantic HTML markup (marking up your "headings" with
elements) will take care of most needs to set bigger sizes.

It's extremely rare to need to set a font-size > 2em, for anything.
Thinking this is a good idea is usually an indication of simple poor,
garish "eBay style" design.

If you still think you need to set em sizes all over the place, then
post again with example pages for where and why you think it's needed.

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Andy Dingley wrote:

> Then after you've done that, normalise all em settings so that nothing
> is less than than 0.75em. Possibly unreadable legal boilerplate might
> go to 0.67em, but that's hard to read and anything less is impossible.

I often drop superscripts down to .67em as they can otherwise disturb line
spacing. In my own writing, superscripts are nearly always footnotes, so
the readability of the textual content is not completely vital, as long as
the link can be followed.

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
[Geek of HTML/SQL/Perl/PHP/Python/Apache/Linux]
[OS: Linux 2.6.12-12mdksmp, up 95 days, 17:51.]

Non-Intuitive Surnames
http://tobyinkster.co.uk/blog/2007/05/25/non-intuitive-surna mes/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

On 2007-05-30, Toby A Inkster wrote:
> Ben C wrote:
>
>> Technically it's a measure of width (of an 'M') rather than of height.
>
> In traditional typography, yes. But the modern definition of an 'em' is
> that an em is the same as the font height.

Thanks, I didn't know that.

> The font height itself is quite a wishy-washy concept, but it can normally
> be thought of as the height of most capital letters and lower-case letters
> with ascenders (e.g. 'b', 'd', 'f', etc.). However, in certain fonts, some
> of these letters may be smaller or taller than the font-height.
>
> The CSS spec says that browsers are supposed to use the 1 em = font height
> definition.

Do you know where it says that? I have in 4.3.2 of CSS 2.1 "em: the
'font-size' of the relevant font". 'font-size' is hyperlinked to 15.7,
which says, "The font size corresponds to the em square, a concept used
in typography."

But you said that in traditional typography, em did mean width of 'M'.
So I am confused. In any case it says "em square" which implies no
distinction between width and height. Are Ms always square?

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Ben C wrote:

> Do you know where it says that? I have in 4.3.2 of CSS 2.1 "em: the
> 'font-size' of the relevant font".

Consider:

div {
font-size: 12px;
width: 10em;
/* width is 120 px */
}

In practice "font size" and "font height" are synonyms.

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
[Geek of HTML/SQL/Perl/PHP/Python/Apache/Linux]
[OS: Linux 2.6.12-12mdksmp, up 95 days, 18:28.]

Non-Intuitive Surnames
http://tobyinkster.co.uk/blog/2007/05/25/non-intuitive-surna mes/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Scripsit Toby A Inkster:

> Ben C wrote:
>
>> Technically it's a measure of width (of an 'M') rather than of
>> height.
>
> In traditional typography, yes.

No, the em unit was originally related to the square in which inscription
letters were designed, so it related both to the width and to the height of
"M", but the connection was lost almost two thousand years ago.

> The font height itself is quite a wishy-washy concept,

Rather, it is redundant. It is meant to help people to get a rough idea:

> but it can
> normally be thought of as the height of most capital letters and
> lower-case letters with ascenders (e.g. 'b', 'd', 'f', etc.).

No, their height is considerably smaller than the font size ("font height").
Try it. Use a 1em by 1em element with a border, with line-height: 1, with a
single character inside it, and see how much space there is both above and
below any of those characters.

If you take the distance from the lowest descender up to the highest
ascender, you get close. Few characters have both a descender and an
ascender; lowercase ("small") thorn is one of the few exceptions. But you
really need a diacritic on it, too, e.g. þ́ (thorn with acute,
not used in any human language) to get a character that occupies the full
height of the font - roughly speaking.

In fact, ascenders, descenders, and diacritic marks may extend a bit past
the limits set by the "font height".

The font size, or "font height", is really a typographic design concept, as
the CSS specifications tell us. When a typographer starts designing a font,
he uses an em square as a tool, designing characters so that they
comfortably fit into it, and some font designs use a larger part of the
square than others, and use it differently. Any normal character is expected
to remain within the em square boundaries, or at most touch them or cross
them just a little.

In a sense, the em square is the drawing board of a font designer. How he
uses it is up to him

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Ben C wrote:
> On 2007-05-30, David Dorward wrote:
>>
>> An em is the font height
>
> Technically it's a measure of width (of an 'M')

Alas, if only that were true. There currently isn't any CSS unit that
corresponds to character width. :(

--
Berg

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Andy Dingley wrote:
>
> body { font-size:1em; font-size:100%; }

You don't really mean to suggest setting both, do you?

font-size:100% is a better choice because it prevents some bizarre
scaling issues IE has with em units.

--
Berg

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Scripsit Bergamot:

> Andy Dingley wrote:
>>
>> body { font-size:1em; font-size:100%; }
>
> You don't really mean to suggest setting both, do you?

Andy's code sets font-size to 100% (of parent element's font size). The
first declaration is ignored, since here we have two settings for a property
of an element, all other things being equal except their order, so that the
latter wins.

Don't ask me why Andy included the declaration that will always be ignored.

> font-size:100% is a better choice because it prevents some bizarre
> scaling issues IE has with em units.

And even that setting isn't needed except for dealing with some browser
bugs. After all, by default the element inherits the font size of
, so there's little point in setting font size to 100% of
font size - except as a workaround to some bugs.

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

"Jim Moe" wrote in message
news:i9mdnfS3-biMusDbnZ2dnUVZ_vumnZ2d@giganews.com...
> Maxx Pollare wrote:

> The default setting for browsers is 1 em = 16 pixels.

Rubbish.

--
Richard.

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

On 30 May, 13:50, Bergamot wrote:
> Andy Dingley wrote:
>
> > body { font-size:1em; font-size:100%; }
>
> You don't really mean to suggest setting both, do you?

Of course.

In practice I usually boilerplate a referenced explanation of why
they're both in there, citing the IE bug.

Some of you have the luxury of writing HTML pages that stay with the
same content _you_ put into them. I unfortunately don't (a bad local
infestation of code pixies).

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

rf wrote:
> "Jim Moe" wrote in message
> news:i9mdnfS3-biMusDbnZ2dnUVZ_vumnZ2d@giganews.com...
>> Maxx Pollare wrote:
>
>> The default setting for browsers is 1 em = 16 pixels.
>
> Rubbish.

I think he just meant that the usual "factory setting" for default font
size is 16px. That is true for mozilla-based browsers, but I can't say
it's true for all browsers.

--
Berg

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Jukka K. Korpela wrote:
> Scripsit Ben C:
>
>>> An em is the font height (or the font height of the parent element
>>> when you are specifying the font-size).
>>
>> Technically it's a measure of width (of an 'M') rather than of height.
>
> No it isn't. This disinformation used to be regularly presented and
> refuted in various newsgroups, but recently it has been more quiet.
> Anyway, if in doubt,
> a) check the CSS specifications
> b) make a simple test:
>

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Scripsit Bernhard Sturm:

>>> Technically it's a measure of width (of an 'M') rather than of
>>> height.
>>
>> No it isn't.
- -
> Jukka: this is true in it's application, but Ben was talking about
> it's 'technical' origin.

No, as you can see from your own quotation, Ben claimed that the em _is_
"technically" a measure of width. That's plain wrong. A common
misconception, not a mortal sin, except perhaps if you actually base your
web site design on. Whatever the meaning of "technically" was, the statement
was false.

> Read a bit about typography (I am a typographer myself)

Would you believe that I have read a bit about typography and written about
it, too?

> The 'em' unit goes back to the Romans using the width of
> the letter 'M' to refer to the size of their letters...

That's what I explained in another message in this thread, emphasizing that
the connection was broken in ancient times. To be exact, the inscription
design used the em as the width of _some_ characters, including "M", but
surely excluding e.g. "I".

And it's just a little story, unless people misunderstand it as having some
impact on the em unit in CSS.

> Don't only look at how the 'em' unit is implemented in the CSS-specs,
> it's sometimes good to know the historical origin of things.

In this case, a little knowledge is just harmful. Historically, the em unit
was never a unit of width alone - only in conjunction with the height.
What's more important, knowing the history, or some distorted version
thereof, seems to make people think that the em unit _is_ the width of "M".

It's not a matter of "implementing" the em unit in CSS specifications. The
CSS unit is simply a reflection of a typographic tradition, in which the em
unit means the size of the font, not the width of anything.

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

On 2007-05-31, Jukka K. Korpela wrote:
> Scripsit Bernhard Sturm:
>
>>>> Technically it's a measure of width (of an 'M') rather than of
>>>> height.
>>>
>>> No it isn't.
> - -
>> Jukka: this is true in it's application, but Ben was talking about
>> it's 'technical' origin.
>
> No, as you can see from your own quotation, Ben claimed that the em _is_
> "technically" a measure of width. That's plain wrong.

I accept that. What did it for me was the idea of an "M square".
Although I suppose that makes saying it's a measurement of width moot
rather than wrong. But since I was correcting someone for saying it was
a measurement of height I can't really pretend that's what I meant.

Do we know whether Roman M-squares were actually equilateral?

> A common misconception, not a mortal sin,

Thank goodness for that.

Various websites do say it's a measure of width, e.g.
http://www.fontfactory.com/glossary.php. So I reserve some judgment on
the meaning in its wider context. But Mr Korpela makes a good point
about what it means in CSS.

I find this in CSS 2:

http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2/fonts.html#emsq

15.4.3

Certain values, such as width metrics, are expressed in units that
are relative to an abstract square whose height is the intended
distance between lines of type in the same type size. This square is
called the em square and it is the design grid on which the glyph
outlines are defined.

I missed that because I usually only work with CSS 2.1, from which all
that has been removed and replaced with just a vague reference to "a
concept used in typography".

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Scripsit Ben C:

> Various websites do say [that the em unit is] a measure of width, e.g.
> http://www.fontfactory.com/glossary.php.

There's a lot of bogus information around, and such statements are useful
bogosity indicators. On that particular page, you can see other bogosity
indicators as well, such as "Extended ASCII", "90º" (using masculine ordinal
indicator instead of degree sign - and they claim to be "Type
Professionals"!), "Circero" (for "Cicero"), etc. - I stopped scanning when I
saw a claim that the circumflex is used in Italian.

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

On 2007-06-01, Jukka K. Korpela wrote:
> Scripsit Ben C:
>
>> Various websites do say [that the em unit is] a measure of width, e.g.
>> http://www.fontfactory.com/glossary.php.
>
> There's a lot of bogus information around, and such statements are useful
> bogosity indicators. On that particular page, you can see other bogosity
> indicators as well, such as "Extended ASCII", "90º" (using masculine ordinal
> indicator instead of degree sign - and they claim to be "Type
> Professionals"!), "Circero" (for "Cicero"), etc.

Those are quite inexcuscable typos.

> - I stopped scanning when I saw a claim that the circumflex is used in
> Italian.

According to some more bogus websites it is.

"In Italian it is used in plurals of singulars ending with -io, thus
ending them with a longer i. In modern Italian this is accomplished with
a double or just a single i as in varî, varj, varii, vari ("various",
plural of vario)."

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Scripsit Ben C:

>> There's a lot of bogus information around, and such statements are
>> useful bogosity indicators. On that particular page, you can see
>> other bogosity indicators as well, such as "Extended ASCII", "90"
>> (using masculine ordinal indicator instead of degree sign - and they
>> claim to be "Type Professionals"!), "Circero" (for "Cicero"), etc.
>
> Those are quite inexcuscable typos.

No they aren’t. ”Extended ASCII” is a factual error. They got the facts
wrong, instead of just pressing the wrong key by accident. Using wrong
character instead of the degree sign is a character-level error – not an
accidental typing mistake. Any typographer should know better. Mistyping ”Cicero”
can be classified as an accidental typo, and it is indeed inexcusable (i.e.,
not excusable) in a purported reference material when it appears _twice_.

Please read a reputable book on typography if you seriously doubt that I am
not right here. Surfing around bogus web pages and citing them takes you
nowhere.

>> - I stopped scanning when I saw a claim that the circumflex is used
>> in Italian.
>
> According to some more bogus websites it is.

So why do you keep citing bogosities? Besides, what you quote from an
unspecified source says that the circumflex is _not_ used in Italian; it
claims that it _was_. There’s a difference, especially if one pretends to
present _reference_ information on typography.

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Ben C wrote:

> On 2007-06-01, Jukka K. Korpela wrote:

>> - I stopped scanning when I saw a claim that the circumflex is used in
>> Italian.
>
> According to some more bogus websites it is.

which is true... the use is not common, but I wouldn't call the
reference to it 'bogus'. I know that Mr. Korpela is going to argue on
this as well :-)
Maybe this url will help him a bit to identify the bogus sites on the web:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circumflex
http://www.scudit.net/mdaccento5.htm

HTH
bernhard







--
www.daszeichen.ch
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Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Jukka K. Korpela wrote:

>
> So why do you keep citing bogosities? Besides, what you quote from an
> unspecified source says that the circumflex is _not_ used in Italian; it
> claims that it _was_. There’s a difference, especially if one pretends
> to present _reference_ information on typography.

please, don't be silly: if a modern italian website is going to quote
the title of an (not so old) italian book (e.g. Pisacane, Carlo
[1818-1857] "Scritti varî, inediti o rari"), would you then also claim,
that the circumflex is of no typographical use in the Italian language?
The italian source of Wikipedia indicates, that the circonflesso is
still in use in modern Italian language according to the rule Ben quoted:

salario(sing) -> salarî (plural)
simposio(sing) -> simposî (plural)

http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accento_circonflesso

cheers
bernhard



--
www.daszeichen.ch
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Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Jukka K. Korpela wrote:
> Scripsit Ben C:
>
>> Various websites do say [that the em unit is] a measure of width, e.g.
>> http://www.fontfactory.com/glossary.php.
>
> There's a lot of bogus information around, and such statements are
> useful bogosity indicators. On that particular page, you can see other
> bogosity indicators as well, such as "Extended ASCII",

As I recall there is in fact an 'extended ASCII' existing. It's more
precicely described as 'high ASCII' because 'extended' could imply that
the ASCII was 'extended' from 7-bit to 8-bit at a later stage (which is
not the case).
however I used to work on old IBM machines, and on IBM PC DOS you can
use the ECS (Extended Character Set) which uses 8-bit values to refer to
the higher part of the ASCII-chart in order to map also European
characters. Again: the information about the 'extended ASCII' is not
that 'bogus' as you are calling it (otherwise you should blame IBM for
labelling it ECS, but then we would also have to blame Microsoft for
labelling their OS as 'Windows' which has nothing to do with a real
window :-).

bernhard


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Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Scripsit Bernhard Sturm:

> As I recall there is in fact an 'extended ASCII' existing.

That's because you have read bogus information. That was understandable - as
was the wrong idea about the em unit - until correct information was given.

> Again: the information about the 'extended ASCII' is not
> that 'bogus' as you are calling it

It definitely is. Common people are excused for their ignorance on this
issue, and on the em unit issue, but people who write references are not.
And ignorance stops being excusable at the point where you start and keep
arguing, without any factual grounds, in public against correct information.

The ASCII code is defined by an American National Standard. There is only
one ASCII standard in force. I have actually acquired and read it. Have you?

What people call "extended ASCII" is just _different_ 8-bit codes, and none
of them carries "ASCII" in their name. This is where the wrong information
becomes harmful and not just ignorance: people will act as if their
references to "extended ASCII" referred to one specific code.

(Similarly, thinking that the em unit is the width of "M" - without ever
bothering to check how wide "M" is in em units - is just a piece of common
ignorance _until_ you start setting things up in a manner that is based on
the misconception. For example, it would be logical to set width: 30em for a
text input field if you have set its font to monospace and want it to be 30
characters wide. Quite logical, since all characters have equal width there.
Just the premise about em being the width of "M" is completely wrong.)

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Jukka K. Korpela wrote:
> Scripsit Bernhard Sturm:
>
>> As I recall there is in fact an 'extended ASCII' existing.
>
> That's because you have read bogus information. That was understandable
> - as was the wrong idea about the em unit - until correct information
> was given.
>
do I understand you correctly, that you are telling us that mentioning
the term 'extended ASCII' is just plain wrong, and it doesn't exist at all?
If that is the case then could you please ask for the deletion of this
Wikipedia entry:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extended_ASCII

I have read it, and I understood it that way, that the 7-bit ASCII forms
the base of all those various extensions. Maybe all the information in
this Wikipedia entry is wrong, as there is no such thing as
'ASCII-extensions'. It should be called 'based-on-ASCII-extensions'?
Enlight me, and it would be a great thing if you really could ask for
the corrections or deletion (if necessary) in the mentioned Wikipedia
entry as many people do rely on such information (including me).

Cheers
Bernhard



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Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

On Jun 1, 10:32 am, Bernhard Sturm wrote:
> do I understand you correctly, that you are telling us that mentioning
> the term 'extended ASCII' is just plain wrong, and it doesn't exist at all?
> If that is the case then could you please ask for the deletion of this
> Wikipedia entry:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extended_ASCII

There, Wikipedia is being descriptivist rather than prescriptivist,
and noting terminology that can be found in use, without necessarily
implying that it's actually "correct" by any logical standard. It
goes on to note that the usage is criticized, and that it's been used
in a fairly sloppy manner to refer to a whole range of different sets
of characters that go beyond those defined in ASCII, and is thus not a
specific character set / encoding, nor is it endorsed in any way in
conjunction with the ASCII standard.

--
Dan

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Scripsit Bernhard Sturm:

> do I understand you correctly, that you are telling us that mentioning
> the term 'extended ASCII' is just plain wrong, and it doesn't exist
> at all?

Of course.

> If that is the case then could you please ask for the
> deletion of this Wikipedia entry:

Why? I have no interest in raising the level of toilet wall engravings just
to see some other people paint their crap over them. Anyone who wants to
know the facts can consult reliable sources.

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Post removed (X-No-Archive: yes)

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Maxx Pollare wrote:

> I'll post back with a weblink of my work later, unless anyone can
> sugest a better news group for /that sort of thing/.

Depends on why you're posting it. If you want a critique, post in
alt.html.critique. If you need help with the markup, alt.html or
comp.infosystems.www.authoring.html are good. For CSS discussions try
comp.infosystems.www.authoring.stylesheets.

--
John

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Jukka K. Korpela wrote:
> Scripsit Bernhard Sturm:
>
>> If that is the case then could you please ask for the
>> deletion of this Wikipedia entry:
>
> Why? I have no interest in raising the level of toilet wall engravings
> just to see some other people paint their crap over them. Anyone who
> wants to know the facts can consult reliable sources.
>

Jukka, I think this is quite an arrogant statement you made.
I always admired your knowledge and profound know-how, but sometimes you
just seem not to be able to accept other facts or point-of-views. If the
above wikipedia source is just 'toilet wall engraving' and not a
'reliable source' to you, then fair enough, but I think it's just not
good enough, if you keep on going criticizing others of not providing
'good' sources to support their statements, but on the other hand you
fail to provide those 'reliable sources' in order to proof your points.
In most cases you just come up with 'I have done that, and I do know it
is that way, do you?'.
Forgive me, but IMHO this is patronising others for their strive of a
(halfway) fair discussion. Although this is not necessary - I believe it
is just good netiquette - but I have never seen you apologising for a
statement you (falsly) made.

bernhard


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Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Dan wrote:
>
> It
> goes on to note that the usage is criticized, and that it's been used
> in a fairly sloppy manner to refer to a whole range of different sets
> of characters that go beyond those defined in ASCII, and is thus not a
> specific character set / encoding, nor is it endorsed in any way in
> conjunction with the ASCII standard.
>

that is all true, but as you correctly mentioned the term is in use and
there are various references to it (even from IBM in their manuals for
Lotus Notes, printers or PC DOS
(http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/redbooks/pdfs/gg244459.pdf for example)).
The term is in use, and can be used even if it's not precise (it's
similar to the use of the word 'Homepage' in German in order to refer to
an entire Website; not accurate, but it's in use :-). Therefore I
wouldn't blame the authors of the website we are discussing for
providing unreliable facts...

Cheers
Bernhard



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Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Jukka K. Korpela wrote:
> Scripsit Bernhard Sturm:
>
>> do I understand you correctly, that you are telling us that mentioning
>> the term 'extended ASCII' is just plain wrong, and it doesn't exist
>> at all?
>
> Of course.
>
>> If that is the case then could you please ask for the
>> deletion of this Wikipedia entry:
>
> Why? I have no interest in raising the level of toilet wall engravings
> just to see some other people paint their crap over them. Anyone who
> wants to know the facts can consult reliable sources.
>

such as this RFC from 1975 about the use of "Extended ASCII" in Telnet
sessions?
http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc698.txt


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Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Scripsit Bernhard Sturm:

>> Anyone who wants to know the facts can consult reliable sources.
>
> such as this RFC from 1975 about the use of "Extended ASCII" in Telnet
> sessions?
> http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc698.txt

The only thing that RFC 698, a "proposed standard" from 1975, is good for is
checking how a particular protocol was defined. It is surely not, and was
never meant to be, any authority or reliable source of information on any
other matter.

I wonder if you realize how ridiculous it is to cite over 30 years old
technical descriptions that use sloppy terminology. Besides, the "Extended
ASCII" described in that document has nothing to do with the "Extended
ASCII" in other documents cited so far. The more you cite mutually
incompatible uses of "Extended ASCII", the more you give arguments in favor
of my point - but you can stop now, since the point is crystal clear to
anyone who has actually checked some reliable sources.

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Scripsit Bernhard Sturm:

> Jukka K. Korpela wrote:
>> Scripsit Bernhard Sturm:
>>
>>> If that is the case then could you please ask for the
>>> deletion of this Wikipedia entry:
>>
>> Why? I have no interest in raising the level of toilet wall
>> engravings just to see some other people paint their crap over them.
>> Anyone who wants to know the facts can consult reliable sources.
>
> Jukka, I think this is quite an arrogant statement you made.

Don't be ridiculous. I don't clean up the shit that other people put around
the Web, and there's nothing arrogant in saying that when the shit has been
cited in public discussion and I was asked to clean it up.

> I always admired your knowledge and profound know-how, but sometimes
> you just seem not to be able to accept other facts or point-of-views.

There's no "other facts" in this issue, or in the em issue. You can have any
point of view you like, but it does not change the facts.

>- - I think it's just
> not good enough, if you keep on going criticizing others of not
> providing 'good' sources to support their statements, but on the
> other hand you fail to provide those 'reliable sources' in order to
> proof your points.

If you want to argue about the meaning of the em unit, or the ASCII code,
then you are supposed to check your facts from reliable sources, on your
own. I've already told you to find a book on typography for the first issue
and the ASCII standard for the latter.

> In most cases you just come up with 'I have done
> that, and I do know it is that way, do you?'.

In matters where it would be pointless to cite references, since the other
side hasn't apparently checked any reliable references. If someone is
willing to argue in public without checking any facts (and reading random
web pages does not count as checking facts), why would he actually check
anything even if I gave an ISBN or ANS number?

> Forgive me, but IMHO this is patronising others for their strive of a
> (halfway) fair discussion.

This "fair discussion" (about the em unit, and then ASCII) is comparable to
discussing whether 2+2 equals 4 or 7, with some people citing novels that
say 2 + 2 = 7. (Yes, there is an enjoyable novel saying that.)

> Although this is not necessary - I believe
> it is just good netiquette - but I have never seen you apologising
> for a statement you (falsly) made.

Your sentence does not really parse. And I don't really care what you are
trying to say with it. You are just babbling pointlessly, since the factual
issues - em and ASCII (which I raised for comparison, as an example of
matters that people have misconceptions about, and you surely proved that) -
are easily resolved as soon as you check facts, and you are just attacking
me for saying this. If there's anyone who should apologize, it's you.

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

On 2007-06-04, Jukka K. Korpela wrote:
[...]
> There's no "other facts" in this issue, or in the em issue. You can have any
> point of view you like, but it does not change the facts.
[...]
> This "fair discussion" (about the em unit, and then ASCII) is comparable to
> discussing whether 2+2 equals 4 or 7

Hardly. We're talking about the meaning of two semi-technical terms:
"em" and "extended ASCII". Words mean what people use them to mean and
if documents are found on the web including the Wikipedia that use terms
in a particular way then that is factual evidence about how they're
being used.

Now you say they're used differently in "reliable sources" and "books"
and you are a fairly reliable source yourself. But Bernhard Sturm, who
is a typographer and also a reliable source, has suggested that the "em"
is a unit of width after all. So there are facts on both sides. Enough
to conclude that there is some legitimate variation in the use of these
terms.

Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Jukka K. Korpela wrote:
>
> I wonder if you realize how ridiculous it is to cite over 30 years old
> technical descriptions that use sloppy terminology. Besides, the
> "Extended ASCII" described in that document has nothing to do with the
> "Extended ASCII" in other documents cited so far. The more you cite
> mutually incompatible uses of "Extended ASCII", the more you give
> arguments in favor of my point - but you can stop now, since the point
> is crystal clear to anyone who has actually checked some reliable sources.
>
Indeed Jukka, I stop here and rather marvel at the mysteries of the
universe.

have a nice day
bernhard


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Re: Pixel to Em conversion...

Scripsit Ben C:

> We're talking about the meaning of two semi-technical terms:
> "em" and "extended ASCII".

No, "em" is a technical term in typography (and CSS), and "ASCII" is a
technical term in computing (and there is no such thing as "extended
ASCII").

> Words mean what people use them to mean

Using technical terms in wrong meanings is simply wrong. No amount of
language philosophy changes this.

> if documents are found on the web including the Wikipedia that use
> terms in a particular way then that is factual evidence about how
> they're being used.

And if we can find 2+2 = 7, then there is evidence that this expression is
really used. It is still an incorrect statement.

> But Bernhard Sturm, who
> is a typographer and also a reliable source, has suggested that the
> "em" is a unit of width after all.

He claims to be a typographer. If he still wants to claim that "em" is a
unit of width, then I won't trust him on any matter.

> So there are facts on both sides.

No, an incorrect statement does not become a fact just because it is written
by someone who purports to be an expert. If a mathematician writes 2+2 = 7,
it's still not a fact.

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/