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From: Matthew Thomas <mpt26@spamfree.land>
Subject: Time for a new FAQ? (finally ready, I think)
Date: 1997/11/10
Message-ID: <3466D83E.7551@spamfree.land>
X-Deja-AN: 288855440
Organization: University of Canterbury, Christchurch,
 NZ (opinions expressed are my own)
Newsgroups: alt.ascii-art


Hello again, it's time for your next dose of FAQ! Open wide ...

A few minor changes.
*   Allen Mullen's name corrected (I knew there'd be a typo somewhere).
*   Links inserted for gifscii and for animation instructions.
*   Don't post pictures to a.a-a *at all*.
*   Checked all URLs myself (found one broken link). Links to GeoCities
    took me a while to check, as GeoCities is a bit unreliable at the
    moment ...

Other notes:

*   I have made an improved HTML version of the FAQ (I started it
    *before* every man woman and his/her dog decided to have a go!).
    I've checked it with lynx (!!!) and Netscape, and everything seems
    to work fine (including <PRE>). In fact the only non-HTML-1.0
    feature used is the occasional <FONT SIZE=-1></FONT>, so it should
    work ok on all browsers. (I've also checked it with weblint, just to
    make sure :-).
    
    The blank lines missing from Martin's version are back where they
    should be, character entities are used where appropriate (eg &lt;
    for <), and the colour scheme is left as the default (I don't
    believe in imposing your particular favourite set of colours on
    everyone else). It also uses a proportional font (on graphical
    browsers :-) for non-ASCII-art text, for easier reading.
    
    I'll update the text and HTML versions in parallel, so we won't have
    half a dozen HTML versions of various vintages floating around. This
    version has been/will be sent to Joan and Martin for uploading.
    (Let me know if the URL given below isn't the one you want to use,
    Joan.)

*   I decided not to link to
    http://www.timestream.com/web/info/mmlaw.html -- IMHO its
    relevance/length ratio isn't high enough.

And now for the latest (text) version ...
----
Subject:
FAQ: New to alt.ascii-art? Read me first!
----
__  __   __     _,
\\  \\   / ___ '||  ___  ___ __  _  _   ___    _/|_ ___
 \\ /\\ / //_\) || // \)// \\ ||'||'|| //_\)    || // \\
  \/  \/  \\__,_||_\\__,\\_//_||_||_||_\\__,    \|_\\_//

      _,
 ___ '|| _/|_     ___   __  ___  () ()      ___  _,_ _/|_
 __\\ ||  ||      __\\ (/_'// \)'||'|| ==== __\\'||\) ||
((_||_||_ \|_ () ((_||_,_/)\\__,_||_||_    ((_||_||_  \|_


Answers to frequently asked questions
by Matthew Thomas
Version 1.0.2
Last changed: 1997-11-10

NOTE: If you are new to Usenet News, please read the messages in
news:news.announce.newusers before posting to any newsgroups. Thanks.

This FAQ is regularly posted to the newsgroups news:alt.ascii-art and
news:alt.ascii-art.animation, and is also available at
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/7373/aaafaq.htm and
http://vibes.vossnet.co.uk/i/ighaig/ascfaq.htm.


Contents
========

1   What is ASCII art, and why do people use it?
2   What is the alt.ascii-art newsgroup for?
3   Help! I can't tell what this picture is supposed to be ...
4   Can someone do my name / these words in ASCII, please?
5   Can someone convert this picture to ASCII, please?
6   Can someone draw me a ...
7   How do I start drawing ASCII art?
8   Ok, I've drawn an ASCII picture. Can I post it to alt.ascii-art?
9   Can I copy this ASCII picture?
10  What should I know about signature files?
11  What happened to rec.arts.ascii?
12  Where can I find more ASCII art?


1   What is ASCII art, and why do people use it?
================================================

ASCII art is any kind of artwork -- pictures, charts, cartoons, whatever
-- drawn with the characters in the ASCII character set.

The ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange) character
set is a set of 128 characters, numbered from 0 to 127, which are
standard on almost all types of computer. The first 32 characters (0 to
31) are various control codes for signalling things like and end of
transmission, a beep, escape, backspace, and so on. The last ASCII
character, 127, is another control code representing the Delete key.

The ASCII characters used in ASCII art are the 95 characters from 32 to
126, as follows.

032 [space] 048 0       064 @       080 P       096 `       112 p
033 !       049 1       065 A       081 Q       097 a       113 q
034 "       050 2       066 B       082 R       098 b       114 r
035 #       051 3       067 C       083 S       099 c       115 s
036 $       052 4       068 D       084 T       100 d       116 t
037 %       053 5       069 E       085 U       101 e       117 u
038 &       054 6       070 F       086 V       102 f       118 v
039 '       055 7       071 G       087 W       103 g       119 w
040 (       056 8       072 H       088 X       104 h       120 x
041 )       057 9       073 I       089 Y       105 i       121 y
042 *       058 :       074 J       090 Z       106 j       122 z
043 +       059 ;       075 K       091 [       107 k       123 {
044 ,       060 <       076 L       092 \       108 l       124 |
045 -       061 =       077 M       093 ]       109 m       125 }
046 .       062 >       078 N       094 ^       110 n       126 ~
047 /       063 ?       079 O       095 _       111 o

These characters are almost completely standard, except for a few slight
variations which you should keep in mind when drawing ASCII art:
# (hash/pound): a hash sign on most computers, a pound (money) sign on
    some British ones
| (bar): a solid line on most computers, but some split it in the middle
^ (caret): differs in size depending on the font used
~ (tilde): appears in the middle of the line in some fonts, at the top
    in others (this especially can make some pictures look odd)
' (apostrophe/single quote): tilts southwest-northeast in some fonts, is
    vertical in others (this may also apply to the comma ,).

Here's a small example of ASCII art using some of these variable
characters: a snow-scene paperweight, drawn by Joan Stark. How good it
looks will depend to some extent on which font and computer system you
are using to view it.
          ____
       .-" +' "-.
      /.'.'A_'*`.\
     |:.*'/\-\. ':|
     |:.'.||"|.'*:|
      \:~^~^~^~^:/
       /`-....-'\
  jgs /          \
      `-.,____,.-'

There is another character set known as ANSI (after the American
National Standards Institute), which consists of the ASCII set with
another 128 characters added to it (128-255), for special characters
such as the copyright symbol and various accented letters. You should
NOT use these characters in ASCII art, though, because they are not
nearly as standardized -- some computers do not support ANSI characters,
and those that do often have different ideas about which code stands for
which character (the Macintosh ANSI characters, for example, are
different from the Windows ones).

People use ASCII art for many reasons. Some of them are:
*   it can be used everywhere -- e-mail messages, BBS and server login
    screens, .plan files (for the finger command on UNIX), and so on --
    because it doesn't require the computer to have a graphics mode or
    to recognize a particular graphics file format
*   an ASCII art picture is literally hundreds of times smaller in file
    size than its GIF or BMP equivalent, while still giving a good idea
    of what something looks like
*   it's easy to copy from one file to another
*   it's fun to do!


2   What is the alt.ascii-art newsgroup for?
============================================

news:alt.ascii-art (sometimes shortened to a.a-a) is a newsgroup where
people discuss ASCII art, post ASCII pictures, post improved versions or
variations of pictures other people have drawn, and generally have fun. 

Types of messages which we usually enjoy seeing include:
*   look, here's an ASCII picture I drew ...
*   REQ: xyz (ie, has anyone got any ASCII pictures of xyz?)
*   suggestions on, or improvements of, other people's ASCII pictures
*   hey-guys-love-your-work-type messages!

Types of messages which we usually *don't* enjoy seeing include:
*   messages with the subject `ASCII art' (try to be a bit more
    informative, please)
*   make money fast!!! ... (yawn, yawn, snore)
*   this is an advertisement for something to do with art in general, so
    I'll post it here
*   don't read this, this is a test (that's what alt.test, misc.test,
    and many other `test' newsgroups are for)
*   MESSAGES IN ALL CAPITALS BECAUSE I SPILLED SUPERGLUE ON THE CAPS
    LOCK KEY AND NOW IT'S STUCK DOWN, OR SOMETHING.


3   Help! I can't tell what this picture is supposed to be ...
==============================================================

If a picture you see posted to this newsgroup looks like a complete mess
to you, don't panic. There are several reasons why it may look weird.

*   If *none* of the pictures in the newsgroup look like what the sender
    describes them as, then you're probably using a proportional font.
    To view (and draw) ASCII art, you must use a fixed-width font -- one
    where all characters are the same width (like on a typewriter).
    If you're not sure if your font is fixed-width or not, check the
    following two lines and see if they're the same length.
    iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii|
    mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm|
    If they aren't, find the option in your news reader which lets you
    specify which font to use. If you just have a choice between
    proportional and fixed width, choose fixed width. If you have a
    choice of which font to use, try different ones until you find a
    fixed-width one (using the `i's and `m's above as a guide). Popular
    fixed width fonts include Courier, Monaco, and Fixedsys; anything
    with `fixed', `terminal', or `tt' in its name will also probably be
    fixed-width.
    
    Some Internet Service Providers (ISPs) supply newsreaders to their
    customers which, strange as it seems, don't allow them to use a
    fixed-width font. If this applies to you, there's not much you can
    do except to ask them for a newsreader which does, or switch ISPs.

*   If there are a lot of almost-blank lines in the picture, then the
    message is probably suffering from `wrapping'. This wrapping may be
    being done by your newsreader; see if it has an option called `wrap
    long lines' or similar, and make sure it is turned off. If this
    doesn't work, then the wrapping was probably done by the news
    program of the person who sent the picture, in which case there's
    not much you can do -- everybody else will be seeing the same thing.

*   If there are a lot of < and > symbols in the picture, with words
    like HTML, FONT COLOR, B, I, and so on inside them, then the picture
    has been sent in HTML format (see Question 8), and your newsreader
    does not understand HTML (most newsreaders don't)

*   If you still can't work out what the picture is supposed to be, try
    reducing the font size (if you can), and moving a couple of metres
    away. If it still looks unrecognizable, then it's probably a problem
    with the news program used by the person who sent the message -- or
    maybe it's just a really bad picture!


4   Can someone do my name / these words in ASCII, please?
==========================================================

Probably not, unless we're REALLY bored. The reason for this is that
there is a program called Figlet which does that sort of thing
automatically -- you type in  `Jane Smith', and you get back
    ___              __,               
   ( /              (          o _/_ / 
    / __,  _   _     `.  _ _  ,  /  /_ 
  _/_(_/(_/ /_(/_  (___)/ / /_(_(__/ /_
 //                                    
(/                                     
in this and a whole lot of other fonts (lettering styles). The ASCII
text-art produced by Figlet can be quite stunning, so it's best to try
it first before asking for help from the newsgroup.

The Figlet home page is at
http://st-www.cs.uiuc.edu/users/chai/figlet.html. This site links to the
FTP site ftp://nicoh.com/pub/figlet/, where you can download versions of
the program for many different platforms.

If you have a Web browser which has form support (most browsers do), you
can run Figlet on the Internet by going to one of the following sites
and choosing your text and options on the Web page. Different sites
offer different options (eg multiple fonts at once, justification, line
length etc). Some of these sites also provide an e-mail Figlet service
for people with browsers which don't support forms.
*   http://www.surfplaza.com/figlet/
*   http://wwwcn.cern.ch/~rigaut/FigletJava.html
*   http://www.schnoggo.com/figlet.html
*   http://www.inf.utfsm.cl/cgi-bin/figlet/
*   http://saigon.mit.edu/dinhyen/figlet/figlet.html
*   http://www.mediacube.de/cgi-bin/moniteurs/figlet/
*   http://www.sconnect.net/figlet/index.cgi
*   http://boulder.Colorado.EDU/~kai/figlet.html
*   http://www.ifi.unizh.ch/cgi-bin/bwagner/FIGLET/figlet.pl
*   http://www.se.cuhk.edu.hk/~mcchau3/cgi-bin/express.html
*   http://www.webserve.com/gateways/figletgateway.pl
(Thanks to Shimrod and Veronica Karlsson for the original list.)

If Figlet doesn't produce the kind of results you want, THEN you can
post to alt.ascii-art with your request. Make sure that you include:
*   the fact that you have already tried Figlet, or don't have access to
    it (otherwise you will probably just get told to use it)
*   a description of the kind of lettering you want, along with any
    other symbols or logos which you would like incorporated into it.


5   Can someone convert this picture to ASCII, please?
======================================================

Yes, but there are a few things you should know before making this sort
of request. Firstly, there are computer programs which convert graphics
files of a particular format (usually GIF) to ASCII art. They go by
names such as ascgif, gifa, gifscii, and gif2ascii. Do a Web search for
any of these programs to find places where you can download them. Try:
*   gopher://twinbrook.cis.uab.edu/1A/atools.70
*   ftp://ftp.wwa.com/pub/Scarecrow/Gifscii/.

However, the output from these programs is often not good (fiddling with
the picture in an image-editing program beforehand may help). In this
case, you can post a request to the newsgroup asking for someone to
`asciify' it, but *please don't post the picture itself*. To save
downloading time for people reading the messages, if possible give the
URL (Web address) of the picture instead.

If you saw the picture on a Web page, you can find out its URL by right-
clicking on it (on the Macintosh, holding down the mouse button) and
selecting `Open this image' (or its equivalent for your Web browser),
then copy the URL from the Location bar to your news program (make sure
you copy it exactly).

If the picture is not on a Web site anywhere, put it up on your own site
(if you have one), or get a friend to put it up on their site, and post
the URL to alt.ascii-art. If you can't do this, post your request to
alt.ascii-art and wait for an artist to reply, then e-mail the picture
to them.


6   Can someone draw me a ...
=============================

Yes, if we find it interesting. Give your request the subject `REQ:
xyz' if you're looking for a picture of an xyz, then in the message
describe more exactly what you're looking for. Generally, the more
specific you are, the more likely you are to get someone to draw what
you want: if you just say something like `can someone draw me a fish'
then you're not likely to get many replies, because people won't be
sure whether or not they're wasting their time by drawing something you
won't want. If you don't have Web access, mention this fact, otherwise
you may get replies consisting only of URLs for the kind of pictures
you're looking for.


7   How do I start drawing ASCII art?
=====================================

You don't need a special program to draw ASCII art with. It can be drawn
using any text editor, such as the Windows or Macintosh Notepads, any of
the various Emacs editors, nedit on Unix, BEd or AZ on the Amiga, edit
in DOS, and so on. You can use a word processor to draw ASCII art, but
remember: (1) use a fixed-width font (see Question 3); and (2) using any
special formatting (bold/italic/coloured etc) is a waste of time, as it
will be lost when you post the picture.

There are some features of editors/word processors which can help when
drawing ASCII art.
*   Overtype, also known as overstrike: removes the need for you to
    constantly realign characters using the Backspace, Space, and Delete
    keys. Try the Insert key if there is one on your keyboard, or look
    in your program's Options or Preferences.
*   Rectangular copy and paste: allows you to select rectangular
    sections of text (not just rows or parts of rows). On programs which
    have this feature, it is usually done by holding down a key such as
    Ctrl while selecting text.
*   Find/Change: allows you to change all the characters of one type to
    another (eg all the ~s to "s).

But before you start, a word about fonts. For ASCII art you should use a
fixed-width font (see Question 3), because every type of computer
system is guaranteed to have one, and that after all is one of the main
reasons ASCII art exists -- because everyone can view it. Different
fixed-width fonts do vary slightly in the *height* of the characters,
but for most drawings this doesn't matter that much.

DON'T try to post pictures drawn in a proportional-width (ie non-fixed-
width) font: even if you specify the exact font you used, the chances
of other people being able to read it are pretty slim (even `standard'
proportional fonts such as Times New Roman can vary in width from
computer to computer).

The other thing to be aware of with fonts is the difference between
serif and sans serif. Here's roughly how an `m' looks in both:
__ __   __        __   __
 |/  \ /  \     |/  \ /  \
 |    |    |    |    |    |
 |    |    |    |    |    |
_|_  _|_  _|_   |    |    |

    Serif        Sans serif

The serif version has little strokes, or serifs, at the end of most of
the main strokes, while the sans serif version doesn't (sans means
`without'). For example, Courier is a serif font, and Monaco is sans
serif. This isn't often important, but if you're using a sans serif
font, just remember to use the vertical bar (|, above \ on most
keyboards) to draw vertical lines, and not the capital i (I), otherwise
it will look weird for people using serif fonts. It also means that you
should think carefully before using characters like L and 7 for various
corners -- they won't always look that good with a serif font.

One way to make drawing ASCII art easier is to type a row of spaces for
however wide you want your picture, and then copy this row and paste it
for however many rows high you think your art will get. Then turn
overtype on, stick your cursor somewhere in the middle, and you're ready
to draw.

If nothing springs to mind immediately, start with the ASCII art
equivalent of the stick figure:

 O
/H\  Person
/ \ 

Fiddle with it, and see what you can do...

 A                    _                o            _
 O   Person wearing   O`              _O_          (< =  Person about
/H\  a dunce's hat   /H\  Professor   XHX  Angel   /H-'  to eat a
/ \                  / \              / \          / \   sandwich...?

Gradually you'll be able to add things like scenery around the person:

 ___  ,---.
/ __\/---. ._,
 /  \@-.  -(_)-
     @     ' `    Person playing a banjo
    ,P            while sitting against a
    d'O_,     MT  palm tree ...
____@/|/________
::::@\O_,:::::::
::::::::::::::::

Draw your cat, your toaster, your musical instruments, your partner,
anything that will sit still long enough -- practice makes, if not
perfect, then at least pretty good. Whether you do small drawings (less
work involved) or large ones (easier to make a drawing recognizable) is
up to you.

The things which give beginning ASCII artists the most trouble are
usually diagonal lines and circles. Here are some lines of various
angles:

|   |   /      ,'      ,-'     _,-'
|  .'  /     ,'     ,-'    _,-'
|  |  /    ,'    ,-'   _,-'          __..--""
| .' /   ,'   ,-'  _,-'      __..--""
| | /  ,'  ,-'  ,-'  __..--"" _______________

And here are a few circular shapes:
                                           _____              __
                                        .-'     `-.        ,dP""Yb,
                                      .'           `.    ,d"      "b,
                                     /               \   d'    _   `Y,
                             _      ;                 ;  8     8    `b
                  __      ,'" "`.   |                 |  `b,_,aP     P
          __    ,'  `.   /       \  ;                 ;    """"     d'
        .'  `. /      |  |       |   \               /            ,P"
     _  |    | |      /  \       /    `.           .'     a,.__,aP"
. o (_) `.__.'  `.__.'    `.___.'       `-._____.-'        `"""''

The spiral is a good example of anti-aliasing -- using the particular
shape of some characters (especially b, d, and P) to smooth the edge of
a solid shape.

A final point: don't use the Tab key. Pressing Tab will go along a
certain number of spaces in your editor/word processor -- but that
`certain number' is different for different newsreaders, editors, and so
on, so your picture may suffer from what is known as `tab damage' when
other people try to view it. Just use spaces instead.

For more tutorials on drawing ASCII art, see the links at the end of
this FAQ.


8   Ok, I've drawn an ASCII picture. Can I post it to alt.ascii-art?
====================================================================

Yes! It doesn't matter if it's not particularly good -- we'd like to
see it anyway. We won't be rude about it (although you'd better tell
us what it is, or we might ask :-), but if it shows potential, you may
find that other people will `re-diddle' it -- change a few characters,
make it a bit better, and re-post it.

HOWEVER, there are a few things you should check before you post any
piece of ASCII art.

*   Are you sending it as plain text? Some news programs, particularly
    those built in to Web browsers, read and write messages in HTML
    (HyperText Markup Language, the language which Web pages are written
    in). HTML allows colours and (using JavaScript) animations in ASCII
    art, but few newsreaders support it, and those which don't will show
    a whole lot of garbage text with your picture hidden inside it.
    
    So if you have one of these HTML-sending programs, PLEASE select the
    option which tells it to send messages as plain text only. If you
    have a picture which uses HTML for a particular feature (such as
    colours or animation), put it on a Web page, and post the URL of
    the page to alt.ascii-art, rather than posting the whole picture.

*   Is it under 72 characters wide? Most news readers can only show
    lines which are under either 72, 76, or 80 characters wide, so if
    your picture is wider than 72 characters it may get wrapped (see
    Question 3). Also remove any unnecessary space characters from the
    end of each line of the picture, to prevent lines from being too
    long (and getting wrapped) without your realizing.

*   Have you used any control codes? Inserting control codes (ASCII
    characters 0 to 31) in a picture can sometimes achieve interesting
    effects on your computer screen or news reader, such as reversing
    text, changing its colour, and so on. DO NOT post any of these
    pictures to alt.ascii-art, for two reasons:
    1   the effects that the control codes have on your news reader are
        almost certainly going to be different from those on the
        thousands of other news readers that other people use
    2   on some news readers, control codes can cause messed up
        displays, messages not appearing, or (in some cases) the news
        reader crashing.

*   If your first line starts with one or more spaces, stick a dummy
    line (such as -- or .) above it, to prevent the spaces from being
    ignored by your news program (this only applies to some news
    programs, and only to the first line of the message).

If you're not sure about whether your message will turn out ok, post it
to a test newsgroup (such as news:alt.test or news:misc.test) first and
make sure (using a different newsreader, if you can) that you can read
it ok.


9   Can I copy this ASCII picture?
==================================

Don't assume that if somebody posts something to a newsgroup, that gives
you the right to use it however you like; copyright laws still apply.
For more information, see the article `Copyright Myths FAQ: 10 big myths
about copyright explained' in news:news.announce.newusers. (It is also
available at http://www.clari.net/brad/copymyths.html.)

ASCII art is often an exception to this rule, though: *generally*, ASCII
artists don't mind if you copy their pictures and repost them or put
them on your own Web site. There are a few important conditions,
however.

*   If the picture contains a few letters in one corner which don't
    seem to be part of the picture, they're the artist's initials. DO
    NOT remove these initials -- would you cut away the part of a Van
    Gogh painting containing his name? Leaving the initials on is a
    small price to pay for being able to use the picture for free.

*   If you're going to use a picture in your signature file, or in a
    place (such as a log-in screen) which means you're going to be using
    it a lot, you should really e-mail the artist (or post to the
    newsgroup, if you don't know their address) and ask for permission,
    because otherwise people may get the mistaken impression that you
    were the one who drew the picture.


10  What should I know about signature files?
=============================================

A signature file (or `sig' for short) is a small, personalized text file
which an e-mail or news program adds to the end of every message a
person sends -- the equivalent of a letterhead for dead-tree (paper)
mail. Usually it contains little more than the person's name,
organization, and e-mail address, and an inspirational quote of some
sort; but some people like to incorporate ASCII art into their signature
files as well.

The biggest problem that this causes is the number of lines that the
signature file takes up. This is a topic which, despite its lack of
importance in relation to global warming, violence in society, and so
on, can be the subject of heated arguments. To summarize, (almost)
no-one will complain if your signature file is four lines long or fewer
-- and it is quite possible to draw good ASCII pictures which are that
small. Some examples are at:
*   http://wwwtios.cs.utwente.nl/~kenter/sigs.html
*   http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/7373/sigs.htm.

Some e-mail programs don't allow you to have a signature file which is
longer than four lines, while others just complain. Five or six lines is
*usually* acceptable, but any longer, and you're starting to take the
risk that your signature will be longer than some of your e-mail
messages; this wouldn't really make sense on paper, so it isn't really
acceptable in cyberspace either. The exception is in messages posted to
alt.ascii-art itself -- we're used to seeing long sigs, so we won't
complain.

But no matter what the *length* of your signature, make sure it's fewer
than 72 characters *wide*, otherwise it may end up a horrible mess --
see Question 8.


11  What happened to rec.arts.ascii?
====================================

rec.arts.ascii was a moderated newsgroup, meaning that all messages
sent to the newsgroup had to pass through an intermediary (the
moderator) who checked them for appropriateness before sending them to
the newsgroup proper.

In the case of rec.arts.ascii, the moderator was Bob Allison (otherwise
known as `Scarecrow'), and he retired from the job in November 1993.
That's why there aren't any messages in the newsgroup any more.


12  Where can I find more ASCII art?
====================================

Lots of ASCII artists put up libraries of their own and others' ASCII
art on their Web sites, as well as tutorials on how to draw ASCII art.
Alan Mullen has links to many of these sites at
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/2695/links.htm.
Yahoo also has a page dedicated to ASCII art, at
http://www.yahoo.com/Arts/Visual_Arts/Computer_Generated/ASCII_Art/.
And try Joan Stark's Web site:
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/7373/.

To find out how to animate ASCII art using JavaScript, see
http://www.geocities.com/SouthBeach/Marina/4942/faq_hta.htm or
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Studios/9334/animlesson.htm.

THE END
----

Unfortunately university holidays will drag me away from my news server
in a couple of days until late February :-(, so I won't be here to see
more suggestions until then -- would someone like to collect them until
I get back? Until then I think that the current version is quite
postable -- everything (I think) that was said about the last two
versions has been either fixed or thoroughly disagreed with :-).

Bye for now ...
--  __
 __/\_\ Matthew Thomas, who enjoys HTML coding even more than ASCII art
/\_\/_/ My real address is mpt26 @ student dot canterbury dot ac dot nz
\/_/\_\ http://kiwipages.co.nz/matthew.html
   \/_/ PS: Why do I see a *piano* whenever I look at llizard's sig? :-)