Need help with font selection

[Cogito]

You didn't do as _I_ wrote (and as HTML specifications do in their
examples):
♕
By the specifications, the semicolon is not always required (e.g., in the
occurrences in the above markup), but it has always been good practice in
HTML to include it. For some odd reason, IE 7 decided to refuse to recognize
&#x2655 without the semicolon. Moreover, the semicolon _is_ required in
XHTML, so maybe you used XHTML on an XHTML-capable browser.

Moreover, you may have missed the font issue I mentioned. So if you have
<td>♕</td>
it's useful (for IE) to have
td { font-family: Arial Unicode MS, Code2000; }
in your stylesheet.

Now we are cooking with gas. In this format it does work and can be
accessible to any user. Just great. Thanks.

Now I need to understand it better. How did you ascertain that
♕ is a queen? Is there a list somewhere?

 

[dorayme]

That is taken (uncredited) from "Chess Mysteries of the Arabian
Knights" by Raymond Smullyan.

I am not quite sure I like the sound of your parenthetical remark. It
is not a conclusion you should be jumping to without careful
consideration. I might arrange for my seconds to be calling on yours.

News to me. How I got it has been indicated publicly ages ago (you
search! I have a bad head cold. Which is my excuse for leaving off the
semi-colon in JK's proposal for a queen char, there is a little story
behind this omission btw, but let me not bore you. Sorry, JK. Or put
up some money and I will try to find it). It came to me via a Guardian
chess puzzle competition in the following manner: a friend, who is a
club player and usually pretty good at these things was stuck. He
asked me because of my fearsome reputation after solving The Desert
with just simple logic and addition/subtraction, also a unique
solution to Rubik's Cube in 1985 when layed up for months with a
skeletal condition (which in no way hampers my duelling technique,
don't get your hopes up, Chris). I have no idea if The Guardian
acknowledged it or not. I hope that book of yours does not have one of
those silly end pages with solutions. The silliest thing I have ever,
ever, seen are Sudoku books with solutions! What could possibly be
their use? Forgive me, I am delirious with feverish cold...

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

Scripsit Cogito:

Now I need to understand it better.

You need to buy my book "Unicode Explained" then. )

Seriously, it's simple: denotes the Unicode character with N as its
code number, in hexadecimal. Well, the Unicode part is not simple, but for
this purpose, you don't need to know very much about.

How did you ascertain that
♕ is a queen? Is there a list somewhere?

Yes, there is a list, and I actually checked (using a text editor) from a
local copy of the plain text file in the Unicode character data base,
http://www.unicode.org/Public/UNIDATA/UnicodeData.txt

But you might find the (non-authoritative, but generally reliable) database
www.fileformat.info/info/unicode/
more convinient: you can search by words and get detailed results, with
images of characters.

 

[Ben C]

That is taken (uncredited) from "Chess Mysteries of the Arabian
Knights" by Raymond Smullyan.


What could the last three moves (White, Black, and White) have been?

Thanks for the hint. I had another look at it, gave up again, and then
checked my email where dorayme had explained it. Very clever. I won't
spoil it for anyone else by posting the solution.

 

[Cogito]

Scripsit Cogito:


You need to buy my book "Unicode Explained" then. )

Seriously, it's simple: denotes the Unicode character with N as its
code number, in hexadecimal. Well, the Unicode part is not simple, but for
this purpose, you don't need to know very much about.


Yes, there is a list, and I actually checked (using a text editor) from a
local copy of the plain text file in the Unicode character data base,
http://www.unicode.org/Public/UNIDATA/UnicodeData.txt

But you might find the (non-authoritative, but generally reliable) database
www.fileformat.info/info/unicode/
more convinient: you can search by words and get detailed results, with
images of characters.

While initially daunting, after spending some time with the links I
follow them completely, and, of course, was able to find the sought
after queen. I'm glad you knew all this stuff and I thank you for
sharing it.
It's amazing how helpful newsgroups are. On this little pet project of
mine, which is just for fun and learning, I posted two questions in
the html forum and one question in the javascript from. The help of so
many newsgroup readers was invaluable. Encouraged with my success I
am already planning my next project...

 

[Cogito]

Just showed the program to someone who asked me "what is this funny
queen"? Turns out they do not have the "Arial Unicode MS" font on
their system. (They are on Windows XP while I am on Windows Vista). Is
the font part of Windows or part of Office?

 

[Ben C]

Just showed the program to someone who asked me "what is this funny
queen"? Turns out they do not have the "Arial Unicode MS" font on
their system. (They are on Windows XP while I am on Windows Vista). Is
the font part of Windows or part of Office?

I'm sure someone already explained this, but you're much better off
using images for the chess pieces because you have no control over what
fonts users have on their systems, and fonts with glyphs for chess
pieces are a bit of a specialized taste.

 

[Jonathan N. Little]

Now I need to understand it better. How did you ascertain that
♕ is a queen? Is there a list somewhere?

By your Newsreader I am assuming you are running Windows.

Start > Run > charmap > OK

Select "Arial Unicode MS"
Check "Advanced View"
Put "2655" in Go to Unicode box to just to the start of the chess pieces

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

Scripsit Cogito:

Turns out they do not have the "Arial Unicode MS" font on
their system. (They are on Windows XP while I am on Windows Vista). Is
the font part of Windows or part of Office?

Part of Office, as I wrote earlier. It used to be freely downloadable, but
that was years ago. As I tried to explain, using the chess queen characters
can be viewed by people who either have Office installed (with "Arial
Unicode MS" installed with it) or have downloaded and installed the
"Code2000" font. That's far from universality, but not particularly poor
coverage, and you previously wrote that the pages are primarily for your
local use.

 

[dorayme]

my fearsome reputation after ...a unique
solution to Rubik's Cube in 1985

mmm... I suppose I better add that it was the slowest solution
ever to have been invented, so idiosyncratic that one has to
coach at length anyone interested or crazy enough to want to
learn it. And just because I feel like it, I will add something
else that is true: only one earthling ever wanted to learn it
from me and that person was Irish. And while at it, something
else true, the solution was so long and boring and impractical
(kids can do it in a min, I can take 10 to 15) that a year later
I had to ask Irish to remind me.

 

[Chris F.A. Johnson]

[...]
If you want a chess puzzle (and the graphic is not so bad), look
at:

<http://members.optushome.com.au/droovies/binHassad/missingKing.ht
ml>

That is taken (uncredited) from "Chess Mysteries of the Arabian
Knights" by Raymond Smullyan.

I am not quite sure I like the sound of your parenthetical remark. It
is not a conclusion you should be jumping to without careful
consideration. I might arrange for my seconds to be calling on yours.

I await the visit. Please bring chess sets and clocks.

The position is from the front cover of the book, published in
1981. The story is in the style used in that book, though it is not
(as I thought) taken directly from the book.

News to me. How I got it has been indicated publicly ages ago

Presumably post-1981.

(you search! I have a bad head cold. Which is my excuse for leaving
off the semi-colon in JK's proposal for a queen char, there is a
little story behind this omission btw, but let me not bore you.
Sorry, JK. Or put up some money and I will try to find it). It came
to me via a Guardian chess puzzle competition in the following
manner: a friend, who is a club player and usually pretty good at
these things was stuck. He asked me because of my fearsome
reputation after solving The Desert with just simple logic and
addition/subtraction, also a unique solution to Rubik's Cube in 1985
when layed up for months with a skeletal condition (which in no way
hampers my duelling technique, don't get your hopes up, Chris).

I only duel over the chessboard.

I have no idea if The Guardian acknowledged it or not. I hope that
book of yours does not have one of those silly end pages with
solutions. The silliest thing I have ever, ever, seen are Sudoku
books with solutions! What could possibly be their use?

I have mixed feelings about books with solutions in the back.
What's the alternative?

Forgive me, I am delirious with feverish cold...

Get well soon.

 

[dorayme]

[/QUOTE]

The position is from the front cover of the book, published in
1981. The story is in the style used in that book, though it is not
(as I thought) taken directly from the book.


Presumably post-1981.

True. I am surprised that anyone would copy my style and go back
in time to do so, that shows a real hunger.

I have mixed feelings about books with solutions in the back.
What's the alternative?

Well, it depends. In a book on Sudoku, no solutions at all.
Perhaps a money back guarantee for if any items have no valid
solution. On chess puzzles, I would think at least some mechanism
to remove the temptations, perhaps an address to write to and pay
for a solution.

Get well soon.

Why thank you, I feel better today just being back on my own
machine, away from dial up, Windows and Google.

 

[Cogito]

Part of Office, as I wrote earlier. It used to be freely downloadable, but

that was years ago. As I tried to explain, using the chess queen characters
can be viewed by people who either have Office installed (with "Arial
Unicode MS" installed with it) or have downloaded and installed the
"Code2000" font. That's far from universality, but not particularly poor
coverage, and you previously wrote that the pages are primarily for your
local use.

For a moment I thought that with this font I may have the best of both
worlds. After re-reading your earlier post I do realise that you had
mentioned Office. My son actually has office on his computer but
perhaps it is an older release. I'm using Office 2007 and it is
certainly there.

 

[dorayme]

Part of Office, as I wrote earlier. It used to be freely downloadable, but
that was years ago. As I tried to explain, using the chess queen characters
can be viewed by people who either have Office installed (with "Arial
Unicode MS" installed with it) or have downloaded and installed the
"Code2000" font. That's far from universality, but not particularly poor
coverage, and you previously wrote that the pages are primarily for your
local use.

For a moment I thought that with this font I may have the best of both
worlds. After re-reading your earlier post I do realise that you had
mentioned Office. My son actually has office on his computer but
perhaps it is an older release. I'm using Office 2007 and it is
certainly there.[/QUOTE]

Do consider a graphic, you can get the queen in many ways. One
way is to choose a large font, get that queen character however
and screenshot it. Prepare it as a png or gif and try specifying
its width in % terms in the css for placement in the table cell.
This will get you some respectable scaling. Worth having a decko
at.

I know that this sort of thing works particularly well when
viewed in a browser like Safari or FF on a Mac with the display
card/OS technology, it is not as brilliant in IE on a Windows
machine (but then, most fonts also look more "bit-mapped" on
these machines after coming from a modern Mac).

Look at:

<http://members.optushome.com.au/droovies/test/chessGifScaling.htm
l>

Depending on whether you just give a width or a width and a
height, you get some interesting results. I have just used a gif
that was handy, imagine a nice queen instead. And look at this in
Firefox. Change the browser text size. Also good in Safari. All
hell breaks loose in iCab, Opera is strange, strange, strange
(but this is not a browser I am familiar with, though I
understand it is very classy).

There might be other ways to control scaling here, you might have
to investigate Andy Dingley's table too. Just some thoughts for
you.

You can also do some of this stuff in em based dims (yes, for the
pics as Alan Flavell once pointed out. There are threads about
this somewhere. I miss this Scot). You might then have to look at
styling the table in same.

 

[dorayme]

Do consider a graphic, you can get the queen in many ways. One
way is to choose a large font, get that queen character however
and screenshot it. Prepare it as a png or gif and try specifying
its width in % terms in the css for placement in the table cell.
This will get you some respectable scaling. Worth having a decko
at.

I know that this sort of thing works particularly well when
viewed in a browser like Safari or FF on a Mac with the display
card/OS technology, it is not as brilliant in IE on a Windows
machine (but then, most fonts also look more "bit-mapped" on
these machines after coming from a modern Mac).

Look at:

<http://members.optushome.com.au/droovies/test/chessGifScaling.htm
l>

Depending on whether you just give a width or a width and a
height, you get some interesting results. I have just used a gif
that was handy, imagine a nice queen instead. And look at this in
Firefox. Change the browser text size. Also good in Safari. All
hell breaks loose in iCab, Opera is strange, strange, strange
(but this is not a browser I am familiar with, though I
understand it is very classy).

It all looks hopeless now I am at a friend's Windows machine with FF
in another suburb. I think it has something to do with Windows not the
suburb. I temporarily give up.

But don't relax too much. I might revisit this at a time you lot least
expect it.

 

[dorayme]

(e-mail address removed) wrote:

A whole lot of rubbish. And just a little bit more babbling:

Here is how I made a little chess set for online communication. I
know, it is not very sophisticated. But it is simple to
understand and reliable:

I fired up an SE 30 Mac and started Sargon IV. It has the best
graphics of any that I have seen. I got all pieces (I think I
actually used ResEdit to get at the resources of the program - a
Mac thing, don't worry. One can also simply capture the images
from the screen) on their squares. In other words, there were two
black queens, one on a white square and one on a black, 4 black
bishops, etc. A position is simply the pieces on their squares
overlayed on a template 'empty' board.

In a program like Fireworks, one can move the objects about with
a mouse or the keyboard arrow keys. It is quick work to set up a
position. If it is kept in the png format with layers, one can
export to gif or low order png for final small file size for
practical use.

 

[dorayme]

4 black
bishops

oops, 2

In fact the 'alphabet' pieces 'on their squares' are 24.

I expect one could make it less but this is easiest because the
background goes with the pieces.

Right. Now what would be nice is to get a scaleable whole board
for cross browser.

This:

http://tinyurl.com/22lbu2

works well on Mac on Safari, Firefox, iCab. It is strange in
Opera and a bit weirdo in Mac IE. Better quality can be had by
preparing bigger initial pic.