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I have had a lot of great comments on my HTML for Whelps article. Many of you have asked for more, and I'm happy to say there is a lot more to share. So, let's take another bite out of HTML.
The first article introduced HTML tags, which are the primary means of adding any markup to a webpage. The other means are special codes in the text for inserting special characters. These are called character entities in geekspeak, but you may know them as extended characters or text symbols that we don't find on a standard keyboard.
These codes are not only useful for adding characters like © and ® to your text, but are mainly for supplying accented letters and international symbols, ala ¿Qué Pasa? They can even make non-Latin language letters available; primarily Greek, as they are used in scientific and mathematical formulae. For example:
A = πr².
Quite possibly the best use of them is for characters we do use often, but thanks to their special use in HTML, like , and &, including them in a post can be tricky and give unexpected results. In these critical cases, it is important to note what the entity codes are for them.
With that, let's talk about what we can do. There are two important differences between entity codes and tags. Like tags, they need a beginning and ending character; however, instead of < and >, we use & and ;. Secondly, case IS important to an entity code, because when using an accented character, Ñ is different than ñ. BUT please note, unlike tags, remarkably, the semi-colon (;) at the end is optional for some web browsers!
So, just demonstrating with a couple entities:
Ñ = Ñ is different than ñ = ñ.
© = © AND © is also legal, but bad form.
For clarity of the reader and to maintain compatibility with all browsers that may deal with this differently, you should always end the code with a semi-colon. I only mention this fact here because it will drive you mad trying to figure out why you might be getting some weird character appearing in your text. For example, you could discover you inadvertantly had "Fishχps" for lunch, when you really had "Fish&chips". (χ is the Greek letter chi and is coded by χ.)
Before listing out the codes, which I've tried to place into useful groups, remember that a) all browsers are not alike, and b) some fonts do not have the symbols you may be wanting. Keep this second point especially in mind here on Vampire Rave, since the font is Verdana by default. While this is a crisp and clean looking font, and it has most of the needed symbols, it still does not have them all. In these cases, the symbols will appear as an empty box, like this: ∉ As a result, I have not listed every possible symbol.
| Codes for common characters | | Symbol | Entity Code | Description | | & | & | ampersand | | > | greater-than sign | | " | " | (double) quotation mark | | ˆ | ˆ | spacing circumflex accent, carat | | ˜ | ˜ | tilde accent
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| Lower / Upper Case Latin-1 Letters | | Symbol | Entity Codes | Description | | à / À | à / À | A grave | | á / Á | á / Á | A acute | | â / Â | â / Â | A circumflex | | ã / Ã | ã / Ã | A tilde | | ä / Ä | ä / Ä | A dieresis or umlaut | | å / Å | å / Å | A ring | | æ / Æ | æ / Æ | AE ligature | | ç / Ç | ç / Ç | C cedilla | | è / È | è / È | E grave | | é / É | é / É | E acute | | ê / Ê | ê / Ê | E circumflex | | ë / Ë | ë / Ë | E dieresis or umlaut | | ì / Ì | ì / Ì | I grave | | í / Í | í / Í | I acute | | î / Î | î / Î | I circumflex | | ï / Ï | ï / Ï | I dieresis or umlaut | | ð / Ð | ð / Ð | ETH | | ñ / Ñ | ñ / Ñ | N tilde | | ò / Ò | ò / Ò | O grave | | ó / Ó | ó / Ó | O acute | | ô / Ô | ô / Ô | O circumflex | | õ / Õ | õ / Õ | O tilde | | ö / Ö | ö / Ö | O dieresis or umlaut | | ø / Ø | ø / Ø | O slash | | ù / Ù | ù / Ù | U grave | | ú / Ú | ú / Ú | U acute | | û / Û | û / Û | U circumflex | | ü / Ü | ü / Ü | U dieresis or umlaut | | ý / Ý | ý / Ý | Y acute | | þ / Þ | þ / Þ | THORN | | ß / ß | ß / ß | small sharp s, sz ligature |
| ISO 8859-1 (Latin-1) Entities | | Symbol | Entity Code | Description | | | | non-breaking space | | ¡ | ¡ | inverted exclamation mark | | ¢ | ¢ | cent sign | | £ | £ | pound sterling sign | | ¤ | ¤ | general currency sign | | ¥ | ¥ | yen sign | | ¦ | ¦or &brkbar; | broken vertical bar | | § | § | section sign | | ¨ | ¨or ¨ | spacing dieresis or umlaut | | © | © | copyright sign | | ª | ª | feminine ordinal indicator | | « | « | left (double) angle quote (guillemet) | | ¬ | ¬ | logical not sign | | ® | ® | registered trademark sign | | ¯ | ¯ or &hibar; | spacing macron (long) accent, | | ° | ° | degree sign | | ± | ± | plus-or-minus sign | | ² | ² | superscript 2 | | ³ | ³ | superscript 3 | | ´ | ´ | spacing acute accent | | µ | µ | micro sign | | ¶ | ¶ | paragraph sign, pilcrow sign | | · | · | middle dot, centered dot | | ¸ | ¸ | spacing cedilla | | ¹ | ¹ | superscript 1 | | º | º | masculine ordinal indicator | | » | » | right (double) angle quote (guillemet) | | ¼ | ¼ | fraction 1/4 | | ½ | ½or ½ | fraction 1/2 | | ¾ | ¾ | fraction 3/4 | | ¿ | ¿ | inverted question mark |
| Microsoft Windows Latin-1 Extended Control Characters (Not Standard) | | Symbol | Entity Code | Description | | ƒ | ƒ | small italic f, function of, florin | | … | … or &ldots; | low horizontal ellipsis | | † | † | dagger mark | | ‡ | ‡ | double dagger mark | | ‰ | ‰ | per thousand (mille) sign | | Š | Š | capital S caron or hacek | | ‹ | ‹ | left single angle quote mark (guillemet) | | Œ | Œ | capital OE ligature | | ‘ | ‘ | left single quotation mark, | | ’ | ’ | right single quote mark | | “ | “ | left double quotation mark, | | ” | ” | right double quote mark | | • | • | round filled bullet | | – | – or &endash; | en dash | | — | — or &emdash; | em dash | | ˜ | ˜ | small spacing tilde accent | | ™ | ™ | trademark sign | | š | š | small s caron or hacek | | › | › | right single angle quote mark (guillemet) | | œ | œ | small oe ligature | | Ÿ | Ÿ | capital Y dieresis or umlaut |
| Other Common Symbols (Not Standard) | | Symbol | Entity Code | Description | | € | € | euro sign | | ◊ | ◊ | hollow diamond suit, lozenge | | ♠ | ♠ | black spade suit | | ♣ | ♣ | filled club suit, shamrock | | ♥ | ♥ | filled heart suit, valentine | | ♦ | ♦ | filled diamond suit |
| Mathematical Symbols | | Symbol | Entity Code | Description | | ÷ | ÷ | divide or subtract, depending on culture | | ⁄ | ⁄ | fraction slash | | ± | ± | plus-or-minus (+/-) | | − | − | minus sign | | · | · | a centered dot | | × | × | multiply | | ⊕ | ⊕ | circled plus, direct sum | | ∧ | ∧ | logical and, `wedge' | | ∨ | ∨ | logical or, vee, vel | | ∩ | ∩ | intersection | | ∪ | ∪ | union | | > | greater than | | ≤ | ≤ | less than or equal to | | ≥ | ≥ | greater than or equal to | | ≠ | ≠ | not equal to | | ≡ | ≡ | identical to | | ≈ | ≈ | almost equal to, asymptotic to | | ∼ | ∼ | tilde operator, varies with, similar to |
| Set Relations | | Symbol | Entity Code | Description | | ⊂ | ⊂ | is a subset of | | ⊃ | ⊃ | is a superset of | | ⊆ | ⊆ | is a subset of or equal to | | ⊇ | ⊇ | is a superset of or equal to | | ∈ | ∈ | is an element of | | ∋ | ∋ | contains as member |
| Arrows | | Symbol | Entity Code | Description | | ← | ← | left arrow | | → | → | right arrow | | ↑ | ↑ | up arrow | | ↓ | ↓ | down arrow | | ↔ | ↔ | horizontal arrows | | ⇒ | ⇒ | double-lined right arrow | | ⇔ | ⇔ | double-lined horizontal arrow ("if and only if" aka "iff") |
| Unary operators | | Symbol | Entity Code | Description | | ¬ | ¬ | logical not | | ∀ | ∀ | for all | | ∂ | ∂ | partial differential | | ∃ | ∃ | there exists | | ∇ | ∇ | nabla, backward difference | | ∏ | ∏ | n-ary product, product sign | | ∑ | ∑ | n-ary sumation, sum sign | | √ | √ | square root, radical sign | | ∫ | ∫ | integral | | ∴ | ∴ | therefore |
| Miscellaneous mathematical symbols | | Symbol | Entity Code | Description | | ∞ | ∞ | infinity | | ∠ | ∠ | angle | | ⊥ | ⊥ | perpendicular | | ¹ | ¹ | superscript 1 | | ² | ² | superscript 2 | | ³ | ³ | superscript 3 | | ¼ | ¼ | a quarter | | ½ | ½ | a half | | ¾ | ¾ | three quarters |
| Greek letters | | Symbol | Entity Code | Description | | α / Α | α / Α | Alpha | | β / Β | β / Β | Beta | | γ / Γ | γ / Γ | Gamma | | δ / Δ | δ / Δ | Delta | | ε / Ε | ε / Ε | Epsilon | | ζ / Ζ | ζ / Ζ | Zeta | | η / Η | η / Η | Eta | | θ / Θ | θ / Θ | Theta | | ι / Ι | ι / Ι | Iota | | κ / Κ | κ / Κ | Kappa | | λ / Λ | λ / Λ | Lambda | | μ / Μ | μ / Μ | Mu | | ν / Ν | ν / Ν | Nu | | ξ / Ξ | ξ / Ξ | Xi | | ο / Ο | ο / Ο | Omicron | | π / Π | π / Π | Pi | | ρ / Ρ | ρ / Ρ | Rho | | σ / Σ | σ / Σ | Sigma | | τ / Τ | τ / Τ | Tau | | υ / Υ | υ / Υ | Upsilon | | φ / Φ | φ / Φ | Phi | | χ / Χ | χ / Χ | Chi | | ψ / Ψ | ψ / Ψ | Psi | | ω / Ω | ω / Ω | Omega |
Let me wrap up with a reminder... Always copy your posting somewhere before posting on VR! Too many people have lost an incredibly witty, long-winded post to the fickleness of the internet. This is NOT a VR problem, but a security issue imposed by the internet itself. It is just a really good idea to write your profile/message/journal entry offline in Notepad or some other editor that you can save your file, then copy and paste it here.
Enjoy the Rave,
The Elder Lurker Daniel
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