5 ms·

Zero-width characters are invisible, `non-printing' characters that are not displayed by the majority of applications. For example, I've ins*erted 10 ze

Zero-width characters are invisible, `non-printing' characters that are not displayed by the majority of applications. F*or exam*ple, I've ins*erted 10 ze*ro-width spa*ces in*to thi*s sentence, c*an you tel**l? (Hint: paste the sentence into Diff Checker to see the locations of the characters!). These characters can be used to `fingerprint' text for certain users. Above is what paragraph looks like in text-only browser in VGA textmode.

kwhitefoot 9y ago
Links 2.8 <http://links.twibright.com/> http://links.twibright.com/> also shows the non-printing characters as big black asterisks. But Emacs doesn't show them in text-mode, have to switch to hexl-mode.
IshKebab 9y ago
Yeah but so what? Almost exactly 0 people use text-mode browsers.
joosters 9y ago
That's just because the browser doesn't handle unicode well. The 'text-only', 'VGA' and 'textmode' are actually irrelevant. The behaviour you are seeing is down to programmer choice/laziness/missing support.
- userbinator 9y ago
  If you're only expecting ASCII text, then not being able to show anything else could even be considered a feature to reduce attack area, since any sort of Unicode trickery then becomes impossible.
  - djsumdog 9y ago
    So what happens when you try to display Chinese or Hindi text? You're just going to get a screen of stars, like you would with unicode square boxes.
    - 0xffff2 9y ago
      "If you're only expecting ASCII text" categorically excludes trying to display Chinese or Hindi text from the program's specification.
  - daveid 9y ago
    There are more languages in the world than English, not supporting Unicode is not an option for most.
    - always_good 9y ago
      Yes, but thread OP was essentially saying "look how those chars appear when you can only render ASCII." And then the person you replied to said that explicitly. I'd wager that both of them know there are more languages than English.
- feelin_googley 9y ago
  s/text-only/ASCII-only, no Javascript/ s/browser/& I use/ s/in VGA textmode// @userbinator is correct; I often find this is advantageous for me and neither need nor want Unicode "support" in ths program; I have other programs I use to view non-ASCII characters if the need arises. I am in agreement with this programmers choices, for the most part. Certainly I agree with this one.

Zero-width characters are invisible, `non-printing' characters that are not displayed by the majority of applications. F*or exam*ple, I've ins*erted 10 ze

kwhitefoot 9y ago

Links 2.8 <http://links.twibright.com/> http://links.twibright.com/> also shows the non-printing characters as big black asterisks. But Emacs doesn't show them in text-mode, have to switch to hexl-mode.

IshKebab 9y ago

Yeah but so what? Almost exactly 0 people use text-mode browsers.

joosters 9y ago

That's just because the browser doesn't handle unicode well. The 'text-only', 'VGA' and 'textmode' are actually irrelevant. The behaviour you are seeing is down to programmer choice/laziness/missing support.

userbinator 9y ago
If you're only expecting ASCII text, then not being able to show anything else could even be considered a feature to reduce attack area, since any sort of Unicode trickery then becomes impossible.
- djsumdog 9y ago
  So what happens when you try to display Chinese or Hindi text? You're just going to get a screen of stars, like you would with unicode square boxes.
  - 0xffff2 9y ago
    "If you're only expecting ASCII text" categorically excludes trying to display Chinese or Hindi text from the program's specification.
- daveid 9y ago
  There are more languages in the world than English, not supporting Unicode is not an option for most.
  - always_good 9y ago
    Yes, but thread OP was essentially saying "look how those chars appear when you can only render ASCII." And then the person you replied to said that explicitly. I'd wager that both of them know there are more languages than English.
feelin_googley 9y ago
s/text-only/ASCII-only, no Javascript/ s/browser/& I use/ s/in VGA textmode// @userbinator is correct; I often find this is advantageous for me and neither need nor want Unicode "support" in ths program; I have other programs I use to view non-ASCII characters if the need arises. I am in agreement with this programmers choices, for the most part. Certainly I agree with this one.