I've been validating some pages at validator.w3.org. It had a problem 
with … for the ellipsis character, and I can understand that 
since that's Windows character set, not iso-8859-1. So I changed them 
all to ….

But I'm wondering about browser coverage. Is a significant number of 
users likely to see a garbage character now, instead of ellipsis? 
Should I just replace it with three dots instead?

-- 
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
                                       http://BrownMath.com/
                                  http://OakRoadSystems.com/
HTML 4.01 spec: http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/
validator:      http://validator.w3.org/
CSS 2.1 spec:   http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/
validator:      http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/
Why We Won't Help You: http://preview.tinyurl.com/WhyWont

18.12.2016, 15:16, Stan Brown wrote:

> I've been validating some pages at validator.w3.org. It had a problem
> with … for the ellipsis character, and I can understand that
> since that's Windows character set, not iso-8859-1. So I changed them
> all to ….

That was a correct move in principle, though not really needed these 
days. Browsers actually interpret … as the ellipsis character (and 
this is even documented in HTML5). I don�t think you can find a browser 
that doesn�t, except perhaps in a museum of technology.

> But I'm wondering about browser coverage. Is a significant number of
> users likely to see a garbage character now, instead of ellipsis?

No. I don�t think any user is.

> Should I just replace it with three dots instead?

A matter of style. The ellipsis character ��� is supposed to have dots 
set more apart from each other than a sequence of three periods (FULL 
STOP) characters, �...�, but this does not always happen. Apparently, in 
a monospace font, it is just the opposite, very much so. Even in 
proportional fonts, the design is not always what you might expect.

Using the ellipsis character is fine if you have reasonable expectations 
for having it rendered in a manner where the dots are spaced acceptably.

-- 
Yucca, http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

Am 18.12.2016 um 16:36 schrieb Jukka K. Korpela:

> 18.12.2016, 15:16, Stan Brown wrote:
>
>> I've been validating some pages at validator.w3.org. It had a problem
>> with … for the ellipsis character, and I can understand that
>> since that's Windows character set, not iso-8859-1. So I changed them
>> all to ….
>
> That was a correct move in principle

And demanded by W3C papers such as 
https://www.w3.org/TR/WD-html40-970708/charset.html. Long before Unicode 
was generally used by many people, it was defined to be the document 
character set of HTML, irrespective of which encoding was actually used 
in a file with HTML text. In the same paper, a numeric character entity 
is defined to refer to the Unicode code point. -- I deliberately chose 
an 20-year-old HTML 4.0 paper to demonstrate that this is not a modern 
fad but has always (or nearly always) been so.

> though not really needed these days. Browsers actually interpret …
 > as the ellipsis character (and
> this is even documented in HTML5). I don�t think you can find a browser
> that doesn�t, except perhaps in a museum of technology.

Depends whether one regards conformane to standards as needed, or 
whether coincidental coverage by browsers is sufficient.

-- 
Helmut Richter

On Sun, 18 Dec 2016 08:16:01 -0500, Stan Brown wrote:
> 
> I've been validating some pages at validator.w3.org. It had a problem 
> with … for the ellipsis character, and I can understand that 
> since that's Windows character set, not iso-8859-1. So I changed them 
> all to ….
> 
> But I'm wondering about browser coverage. Is a significant number of 
> users likely to see a garbage character now, instead of ellipsis? 
> Should I just replace it with three dots instead?

Thanks Jukka and Helmut, for your prompt and clear answers.

I suppose either way, … or …, I'm relying on the browser 
to do what I want. But it's important to me to have my pages pass 
validation without errors or warnings, I think I'll stick with the 
Unicode character.

-- 
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Tompkins County, New York, USA
                                       http://BrownMath.com/
                                  http://OakRoadSystems.com/
HTML 4.01 spec: http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/
validator:      http://validator.w3.org/
CSS 2.1 spec:   http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/
validator:      http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/
Why We Won't Help You: http://preview.tinyurl.com/WhyWont

On 12/18/2016 06:16 AM, Stan Brown wrote:
> I've been validating some pages at validator.w3.org. It had a problem 
> with … for the ellipsis character, and I can understand that 
> since that's Windows character set, not iso-8859-1. So I changed them 
> all to ….
> 
> But I'm wondering about browser coverage. Is a significant number of 
> users likely to see a garbage character now, instead of ellipsis? 
> Should I just replace it with three dots instead?
>
  Use "…" instead. It is properly translated to whatever the
character set is. In general it is safer to use character entities
rather than numeric escape sequences.

-- 
James Moe
jmm-list at sohnen-moe dot com
Think.

In comp.infosystems.www.authoring.html message <MPG.32c0561ec73451db98fa
4d@news.individual.net>, Sun, 18 Dec 2016 08:16:01, Stan Brown
<the_stan_brown@fastmail.fm> posted:

>I've been validating some pages at validator.w3.org. It had a problem
>with &#133; for the ellipsis character, and I can understand that
>since that's Windows character set, not iso-8859-1. So I changed them
>all to &#x2026;.
>
>But I'm wondering about browser coverage. Is a significant number of
>users likely to see a garbage character now, instead of ellipsis?
>Should I just replace it with three dots instead?

The ellipsis characters that I have seen are weak, feeble, and thin.
But so are three dots ... .

Choose whatever is most visible in common fonts and browsers, and passes
your preferred validators.

The full stop itself is also commonly feeble, and that is particularly
bad as it is commonly used as a decimal point in English-speaking
locations.

-- 
 (c) John Stockton, Surrey, UK.  �@merlyn.demon.co.uk   Turnpike v6.05   MIME.
 Merlyn Web Site <                       > - FAQish topics, acronyms, & links.

19.12.2016, 21:09, Dr J R Stockton wrote:

> The ellipsis characters that I have seen are weak, feeble, and thin.
> But so are three dots ... .

That is sadly true for many widely used fonts. It is, however, an issue 
with fonts and typography, with no particular HTML aspect.

(HTML *could* have an element like <ellipsis> or an entity like 
&ellipsis; with the definition that it should be rendered as an ellipsis 
symbol in a manner that depends on the document language. But it doesn�t.)

> Choose whatever is most visible in common fonts and browsers,

That�s much more complicated than it sounds. We don�t really know what 
fonts are common, though we may have some reasonable guesses. In most 
cases, we can�t really pay much attention to such criteria when choosing 
fonts, since there are so many criteria that are more crucial.

It�s so complicated that people may just decide it�s not worth it and 
use the simple solution, �...� (three consecutive FULL STOP characters).

> and passes
> your preferred validators.

I don�t see how validators would be relevant here. Use ��� as such, or 
&hellip;, or one of the equivalent numeric character references. The 
choice does not matter as regards to the typography issue.

> The full stop itself is also commonly feeble, and that is particularly
> bad as it is commonly used as a decimal point in English-speaking
> locations.

It�s a problem character, as it has been for centuries, long before HTML 
was created.



-- 
Yucca, http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

On Mon, 19 Dec 2016 19:09:11 +0000, Dr J R Stockton wrote:

> The ellipsis characters that I have seen are weak, feeble, and thin.
> But so are three dots ... .

So fatten them up: bracket them between <B> and </B> tags :-) .

Cheers, -- tlvp
-- 
Avant de repondre, jeter la poubelle, SVP.

On Tue, 20 Dec 2016 20:12:30 +0200, "Jukka K. Korpela"
<jkorpela@cs.tut.fi> wrote:

> It�s a problem character, as it has been for centuries, long before HTML 
> was created.

Full stops used to punch holes in Mimeograph stencils.

-- 
Joy Beeson
joy beeson at comcast dot net
http://wlweather.net/PAGEJOY/