link to text file, but display 3rd occurnc of word

[vjp2.at]

Is there like a way I can say something like this pseudocode?

http://www.glop.com/flop.txt?#&%Find="slop"&#%Occurance=3

or more crudely

http://www.glop.com/flop.txt?#&%Find="slop"&#%Find="slop"&#%Find="slop"

I want to post something in a blog where I put a pointer to a big file
from which I want to show a small piece. But the blog as a size limit
on posts (at least its spamblocker seems to).

 

[dorayme]

I want to post something in a blog where I put a pointer to a big file
from which I want to show a small piece.

Just give the url to the file and #whatever at the end and id the
heading or something at the start of what you want folk to read
in the destination file, telling people to go to

<a href="someASbsoluteURL.html#process">process design</a>

and at the bit of the file you want, say it has a heading

<h2>Process design</h2>

change it to

<h2 id="whatever">Process design</h2>.

The other (older fashioned method for older browsers) is to do
what you can see by checking the source of

<http://www.sn2.com.au/reports.html#process>

You will see that this is a demo for you of how to get from here
to a particular part of some other page.

 

[Toby Inkster]

<h2>Process design</h2>
change it to
<h2 id="whatever">Process design</h2>.

But, from the OP:

i.e. text/plain, not text/html.

So the answer is no.

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

Scripsit (e-mail address removed):

Is there like a way I can say something like this pseudocode?

http://www.glop.com/flop.txt?#&%Find="slop"&#%Occurance=3

It would be better to explain what you mean than to write "pseudocode".
Spelling out the information in the Subject line would have been a good
idea - and would hopefully have emphasized that you mean a _plain text_
resource.

No, there is no way to refer to a particular location within a plain text
file with a URL.

I want to post something in a blog where I put a pointer to a big file
from which I want to show a small piece. But the blog as a size limit
on posts (at least its spamblocker seems to).

I guess you mean "the blog has a size limit", but I cannot guess why you
mention this. How would a size limit affect links?

Anyway, what you _could_ do (technically) is to set up a relatively simple
server-side script that reads the content of a plain text file, passed to it
as a parameter, and extracts a given piece of it, specified (e.g.) by line
numbers, and returns the fragment specified that way. Then you could
construct a URL that refers to the script with the desired parameters.

In addition to the work needed to set up the script, there might be
copyright considerations. Such a script might be construed as a method of
making part of a work available to the public in a new way, so you might
need to copyright owner's permission. This is debatable, but I would not
risk getting sued just to make a reference more user-friendly; just
referring to the big file and asking people to look at lines 1042 through
1050, or something like that, would be simple enough.

 

[dorayme]

But, from the OP:


i.e. text/plain, not text/html.

So the answer is no.

Yes, ok. He wants someone to get to something and then read it by
clicking things. So he needs to make it available on a server
either to read or download. He should get the bit he wants folks
to read and simply html it (if the whole is too much trouble) or
make a file of the bit for download or reading.

I accept your correction but am trying to rise above it as
majestically* as I can.

Which reminds me: I should from now on do the modern thing and
just use id and not bother with the name construction, nor the
<a...></a> business at the destination id when linking to jump
into the middle of a page. Even my oldest browser on this machine
here - Mac IE 5 - is happy with the simpler construction.

* [btw, saw The Queen last night, great. Of not ridiculous length
for a change for a modern film, tight script focussing on a set
dramatic period, very strong characterisations, and almost a
human glimpse into her ladyship (as distinguished from actors
doing their thing and entertaining us].

 

[dorayme]

I want to post something in a blog where I put a pointer to a big file
from which I want to show a small piece. But the blog as a size limit
on posts (at least its spamblocker seems to).

I guess you mean "the blog has a size limit", but I cannot guess why you
mention this. How would a size limit affect links?[/QUOTE]

I think he has in mind that otherwise he would quote the bit
right there and then. But that a link would be shorter... etc.

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

Scripsit dorayme:

I think he has in mind that otherwise he would quote the bit
right there and then. But that a link would be shorter... etc.

Sounds like a good guess. That would mean that the piece being "small" is
rather relative. A small piece for a file, but a large piece for a blog.

 

[dorayme]

Scripsit dorayme:


Sounds like a good guess. That would mean that the piece being "small" is
rather relative. A small piece for a file, but a large piece for a blog.

Reminds me of the first earthling on the moon saying it was a
small step for (a) man but a big step for mankind. I recall at
the time wincing that he left out the definite article (unlike
your correct inclusion of it) before "man". I mean, really, fancy
making a linguistic mistake - albeit a non formal one - on first
stepping on the moon. At least martians mind their language when
stepping on various celestial bodies for the first time.

 

[Toby Inkster]

Reminds me of the first earthling on the moon saying it was a
small step for (a) man but a big step for mankind. I recall at
the time wincing that he left out the definite article (unlike
your correct inclusion of it) before "man".

"a" is the indefinite article. "the" is the definite article. Though I
believe Armstrong claims to have said "a", but it didn't come through due
to transmission problems. (Telecommunications was then very much still in
its infancy when compared with today.)

 

[dorayme]

"a" is the indefinite article. "the" is the definite article. Though I
believe Armstrong claims to have said "a", but it didn't come through due
to transmission problems. (Telecommunications was then very much still in
its infancy when compared with today.)

"a" is the indefinite article. What did I say? Must be
transmission problems... Just remember though, I have been on
earth a while, so it is not so bad.

Actually I heard that story about the transmission, I am
skeptical. But who knows, is there a hint of a gap in the
transmission? And about telecommunications being in its infancy,
how about comparing it to 19th century efforts to balance things
up?

 

[Toby Inkster]

But who knows, is there a hint of a gap in the transmission? And about
telecommunications being in its infancy, how about comparing it to 19th
century efforts to balance things up?

You can't compare it with 19th century telecommunications because there
were no 19th century attempts to use telecommunications technologies in
space.

 

[dorayme]

You can't compare it with 19th century telecommunications because there
were no 19th century attempts to use telecommunications technologies in
space.

In the 19th Century, we were very advanced in such things. But
let me only address puny earthling adventures: now you are
qualifying "telecommunications with "space". That is a way to win
the argument! But how fairly? Are human space communications so
very different to all other ether transmissions that the zero
point is somewhere in the 1990's?

Lets cut to the chase. I have absolutely incredibly sensitive and
big antennae (ears, to you, earthling) and I heard Armstrong
direct, never mind transmissions, shranmissions...

 

[vjp2.at]

Thanks all. I realised it was a long shot.


- = -
Vasos Panagiotopoulos, Columbia'81+, Reagan, Mozart, Pindus, BioStrategist
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/vjp2/vasos.htm
---{Nothing herein constitutes advice. Everything fully disclaimed.}---
[Homeland Security means private firearms not lazy obstructive guards]
[Urb sprawl confounds terror] [Remorse begets zeal] [Windows is for Bimbos]

 

[Andy Dingley]

You can't compare it with 19th century telecommunications because there
were no 19th century attempts to use telecommunications technologies in
space.

There certainly were! There's a whole history of attempts to signal to
the canal-dwellers of Mars with optical telegraphs.

Perhaps dorayme could ask one of their grand-siblings?

 

[Toby Inkster]

There certainly were! There's a whole history of attempts to signal to
the canal-dwellers of Mars with optical telegraphs.

The signallers were not in space.

 

[Toby Inkster]

You can't compare it with 19th century telecommunications because there
were no 19th century attempts to use telecommunications technologies in
space.

To clarify my stance, most people would consider, say, London (UK) to
Auckland (NZ) as long distance telecommunications.

However, the distance from the Earth to the Moon is *thirty* *times*
*further* -- just think about that distance -- and with no wires or
relay stations along the way. And in between the two communicating
parties, you may have to deal with not one, but two celestial bodies
blocking the direct "line of sight". (Though I assume the Apollo
missions were carefully timed to minimize the problems this might
cause.)

Manned space flight had only begun eight years earlier, with Yuri
Gagarin's flight, and he'd only ascended just over 300km. That's less
than the distance between London and Belfast, and half the distance
between London and Aberdeen. So early space flights like this
provided little help in planning Earth-Moon communications.

Frankly I think it's a miracle that Houston managed to hear anything
at all, so the loss of just a single monosyllabic word cannot be
faulted.

Comparing pre-1950s terrestrial communication with Earth-Moon
communications is like comparing that Ikea flat-packed chair you
assembled to the construction of the Eiffel Tower.

 

[Andy Dingley]

The signallers were not in space.

Well they weren't firmly grounded on the Earth any more, that's for
sure.

 

[Andy Dingley]

However, the distance from the Earth to the Moon is *thirty* *times*
*further* -- just think about that distance --

In a nice hard low-loss vacuum. With massive groundstations.

Power isn't the problem in long-range radio comms, it's noise. Although
the distance is high and so inverse square law losses are too, then
there's less trouble with noise sources than you can find inside the
atmosphere.

Also Apollo did have long comms blackouts. There was never more than
one body (the Moon) in the way as they had a global network of
basestations (one was a ship now being scrapped on Teesside). Far side
of the Moon was still a hoel though.

Comparing pre-1950s terrestrial communication with Earth-Moon
communications is like comparing [...]

EME comms (Moonbounce) is twice as far and can be done with '50s
vintage high-end amateur kit in the 2m band.

1930s terrestrial comms was also surprisingly sophisticated. Look at
the cross-channel microwave link. There's little in the Apollo-vintage
comms that was fundamentally different from the best of the late '30s.
Some of the engineering was different, but not the physics. Magnetrons
and klystrons were much the same, travelling wave tubes were new but I
don't think any of the downlinks even used MASERs.

 

[Ben C]

In a nice hard low-loss vacuum. With massive groundstations.

Power isn't the problem in long-range radio comms, it's noise. Although
the distance is high and so inverse square law losses are too

Do you not somehow focus the wave? Using a dish for example on the
transmitter, so it travels parallel like a spotlight beam, or perhaps
you let it fan out a bit but not inverse-square law.

[snip]

Comparing pre-1950s terrestrial communication with Earth-Moon
communications is like comparing [...]

EME comms (Moonbounce) is twice as far and can be done with '50s
vintage high-end amateur kit in the 2m band.

1930s terrestrial comms was also surprisingly sophisticated. Look at
the cross-channel microwave link. There's little in the Apollo-vintage
comms that was fundamentally different from the best of the late '30s.
Some of the engineering was different, but not the physics. Magnetrons
and klystrons were much the same, travelling wave tubes were new but I
don't think any of the downlinks even used MASERs.

People overestimate the rate of development of technology because of
computers. But other things haven't developed as fast, and a lot of
developments in apparently unrelated areas of technology have actually
come by way of fitting small computers into everything to replace
mechanical control systems.

 

[Andy Dingley]

Do you not somehow focus the wave? Using a dish for example on the
transmitter, so it travels parallel like a spotlight beam, or perhaps
you let it fan out a bit but not inverse-square law.

You can "focus the beam" in the "near field" but not in the "far
field". This is the same for spotlights or for radio, although as
antenna sizes are measured in terms of wavelength, it's generally
easier to make usefully "large" focussing devices for light than for
radio. Once you get to lunar distances though, it's the far field.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Near_field

The big dish is just to capture more signal on reception.

People overestimate the rate of development of technology because of
computers.

It's not about the rate, so much as the prevalence. Something might
have been possible and demonstrated once in the 1930s but then didn't
become common until the late '60s. Whether it was in Apollo or not then
demands on whether NASA trusted it. In some ways Apollo was technically
adventurous, in others it was distinctly backward looking for
reliability's sake. Given the poor reliability of missile systems and
the US Navy space program, compared to NASA's good record, then it was
the right choice.