GuideML Acronyms and Jargon
Created | Updated Jul 29, 2003
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You will notice that many of the sections are TO BE WRITTEN
or NOT FINISHED and the way things are going, I'm not going to get it all done in time for the deadline
If you want to write and/or edit a section, please start a conversation with an appropriate subject name, e.g. "The Section on Fonts"
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six7s
<forTestingPurposesOnly>
Alabaster
|
Brunel
|
Classic Goo
|
Plain
</forTestingPurposesOnly>
<toBeDeleted>
How to
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C743
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C801
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Thread
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Clinic
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Index
</toBeDeleted>
Intro goes here
TO BE WRITTEN
Links in
ITALICS
are to another section of this page
Acronyms
FAQ
Frequently
Asked
Questions
:
Most good websites and communities write a page of the most commonly
asked questions ( with the answers ) that relate to the acronyms and jargon that can so easily confuse the readers.
GIF
Graphics
Interchange
Format
:
One of the most popular graphics (picture) formats on the Internet
Due to copyright issues, the only pictures in use on h2g2 are those
in the
GuideML-PictureLibrary
Some of the Smileys on h2g2 are animated gifs
HTML (XML and XHTML)
Hyper
Text
Mark-up
Language
(
eXtensible
Markup
Language
and
eXtensible
Hyper
Text
Markup
Language )
:
These mark-up languages are similar to GuideML
Mark-up code specifies the layout and format of any words and tells the browser where to find any pictures and where links (or hyperlinks) are pointing to.
A hyperlink is a piece of text or an image that can be clicked on to take the reader to a conversation, a new page or just somehere else on the same page
You can view the coding of any website by going to
View
|
Source in an Internet Explorer or Opera
BROWSER
(WHAT ABOUT THE OTHER BROWSERS????)
JPEG (aka JPG)
Joint
Photographers
Expert
Group
:
Another popular graphics format on the Internet, similar to
GIFs
URL
Uniform
Resource
Locator
:
The address of an internet site such as :
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/
Jargon
A pages
All h2g2 Researchers can write entries for the Guide using what are known as A Pages simply because of the way a
URL
is written.
For example :
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A123456
would also be known as
A123456
Alabaster
See
SKINS
Attribute
An extra piece of information that goes inside an
OPENING TAG
to further define how things will look on the finished page
For example, ALIGN = "CENTER" is an attribute that can be added to a <P> (paragraph opening tag) like so: <P ALIGN = "CENTER"> to create a centred paragraph
Note that American spelling is used in all GuideML tags AND attributes, even though h2g2 is a BBC site
Blob
A name for the images in the
GuideML-PictureLibrary
that can be used in h2g2 pages
Bold
A technique for making text stand out, using the
<B> and </B>
pair of
TAGS
This text is in bold
This text isn't in bold
Browsers
NOT FINISHED
WHAT ABOUT DIGIBOXs??? AND A (VERY) BRIEF DECRIP OF EACH???
These are the different brands of software designed let people read and navigate around the Internet
Examples:
Internet Explorer
Mozzilla
Netscape
Opera
See
Web Browsers - an Historical Overview
Brunel
See
SKINS
Bugs
When mentioned in relation to computers, these aren't of the insect
variety. Computer bugs are errors in coding that produce unexpected
and/or weird results
When creating or editing a GuideML page, common bugs in your code will be identified when you click on Preview or Update
Bulleted lists
NOT FINISHED
These are used to draw attention to individual points in a list using
symbols like ù or ø instead of numbers
FIND THE RIGHT ENTITY CODES
A BIT ABOUT NESTING?? MAYBE NOT??
Comments
Although everything you write in your code is seen by a
PARSER
comments are rendered completely invisible on the finished page.
To write a comment, use
<!--
before the text you want to be invisible and
-->
afterwards
They can be used to write short notes for yourself, which can be very helpful if you need to change something a few months later and it looks like a foreign language again
Classic Goo
See
SKINS
Closed tags
See
TAGS
DNA
TO BE WRITTEN
Named in honour of
Douglas Noel Adams
Entries
NOT FINISHED
All registered H2G2 Researchers have their own Personal Space on a
U Page
and they can write articles on
A Pages
Error Messages
NOT FINISHED
Fonts
TO BE WRITTEN
Fixed format
NOT FINISHED
Text written inside the <PRE> and </PRE>
TAGS
Gadgets
TO BE WRITTEN
Goo
See
SKINS
GuideML
TO BE WRITTEN
Header
TO BE WRITTEN
Hex numbers
NOT FINISHED
HEXadecimal numbers can
1
be used to specify the colours of
FONTS
used in GuideML entries
There are 16 hexadecimal values:
decimal
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
Hexadecimal
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
A
B
C
D
E
F
As the font colour scheme uses six hex numbers (eg 123ABC) there are over 16 million possible combinations but there are only 216
Web Safe
colours to choose from and as there are already four
SKINS
in use on h2g2, the choice of font colours that are suitable for
EDITED ENTRIES
is limited to ?????????
WHO'S GOING TO WRITE AN ENTRY ON HOOTOO SKIN SAFE FONT COLOURS??
Horizontal rule
TO BE WRITTEN
Hypertext
Also known as Hyperlinks and Links
See
HTML
Italics
The term has two common meanings on h2g2, and they are related
A technique for making text stand out,
using the <I> and </I>
pair of
TAGS
This text is in italics
This text isn't in italics
The Editors are also known as the Italics simply because of
the way their names appear in conversations
INTRODUCTION
Illegal Use
TO BE WRITTEN
Markup
TO BE WRITTEN
Marquee
The < MARQUEE > tag is used to make text or images scroll - sideways and/or up and down.
Because it only works properly in versions 3 and later of the Microsoft Internet Explorer
BROWSER
, marquee is not suitable for
EDITED
guide entries but can be used in GuideML
PERSONAL SPACES
See
A study of the < MARQUEE > tag in GuideML
Named Entries
Some pages on h2g2 have names (rather than just A numbers, like A123456) and there are two ways to link to them
In conversations and plain text (i.e. not GuideML) Guide Entries, you surround the name with
< ./ >
and
< /. >
tags and in GuideML entries, you use the
GuideML-LINK
tags
See
Named Entries
for more information
Nesting
Nesting is a term used with
TAGS
that means having one or more types of tag wrapped up within another
For example
<P> The quick brown fox <B> jumps <I> over </I> the </B> lazy dog
has a pair of italic tags nested inside a pair of bold tags, which are also nested inside a
pair of paragraph tags and looks like this when seen in a GuideML entry
The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog
Opening Tags
See
TAGS
Ordered Lists
TO BE WRITTEN
<OL> and </OL>
Parser
TO BE WRITTEN
Pixel
PICture ELement : a tiny square of screen space
Everything seen on a screen (text, pictures, animations etc) is made up of hundreds of rows that are one pixel high and hundreds of pixels wide
The higher the screen
RESOLUTION
, the more pixels there are on the screen so the higher the visual quality of the image
Refresh
pressing the F5 key will update (refresh) the page so that you see the latest version of a page, handy if your My Conversation
GADGET
tells you there has been a new post to a conversation you are following
Resolution
Screen resolution determines the number of pixels your monitor (screen) displays
Common settings include:
-
640 by 480
-
800 by 600
-
1024 by 768
-
1280 by 1024
-
1600 by 1200
and
-
Self Closing Tags
There aren't many of them, but they are used quite often.
They are the exception to the rule that all
TAGS
must be used in pairs .
One common self closing tag is the line break ( <BR/> ), which makes the next piece of text appear on a new line.
For example, writing
The quick
<BR/>
brown fox jumps
<BR/>
over the lazy
<BR/>
dog
will produce this :
The quick
brown fox jumps
over the lazy
dog
Skins
The skins in use on h2g2 all do (essentially) the same job of displaying pages but with their own colour schemes and layouts.
To change your skin for all pages on h2g2, use the Preferences button.
Use these links to see this page in the relevant skin
Alabaster
: teal green??? links and black text on a white background with teal green???? and orange borders.
Alabaster looks quite business-like, ideal if you want people looking over your shoulder to think you are working.
Brunel
: blue links and black text on a white background with
lime green and grey borders on U pages and
Burgundy??Red?? and grey borders on all???? other pages
Brunel users have the option of customising these colours by ???????????????
Classic Goo
(or just Goo): the original h2g2 skin has brownish???? links and white text on a dark blue background.
Goo is the only skin that has the option of using frames, which can slow down load times but lets you navigate between conversation threads with ease.
Plain
: is currently (April 2003) only a prototype skin, rushed through to help Digibox users.
It is similar to Brunel with blue links and black text on a white background but is purposely light on graphics to speed up download times.
Smileys
TO BE WRITTEN
Subheader
TO BE WRITTEN
Syntax
TO BE WRITTEN
Table
TO BE WRITTEN
A way of arranging text and/or images in rows and columns
Tags
Tags are bits of code surrounded by
<
and
>
brackets that control how text and/or pictures entries appear
Understanding how tags work is such an important step in learning how to make GuideML (and HTML etc) work properly that
Tags ????? A986114
is dedicated to them
But, in a nutshell, apart from a few
SELF-CLOSING TAGS
, they must always be used pairs (one opening and one closing)
For example :
In a GuideML entry, the <B> and </B> pair is used to make the text within them bold and the <I> and </I> pair is used to make the text within them italicised, so writing
The quick
<B>
brown
</B>
fox jumps over the
<I>
lazy
</I>
dog
will produce this:
The quick
brown
fox jumps over the
lazy
dog
Unordered list
TO BE WRITTEN
U pages
The Personal Space of a registered h2g2 Researchers is often referred to as a U Page because of the way a
URL
is written.
For example :
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/U123456
would also be known as
U123456
Web Safe Colours
TO BE WRITTEN
Web Safe Colours
XXXXXXXXXXX
MORE
Symbols
&
To the computers that control how things look on pages written in
GuideML, the & (ampersand) symbol is reserved for use in a special way.
To use it in an ordinary (human) way, it must be written as &
Test &
Note that the semi-colon at the end MUST be included
Non
Breaking
SPace:
The computers that control how things look on a DNA page will ignore all but the first space between any letters and/or numbers.
To get around this,
(with the semi-colon at the end) can be used in GuideML and the
The <space>
smiley can be used in conversations
Further Reading
Spicing Up Your User Page
Written and Researched by:
U135628
and
U135642
Title
Top / Everything / All About h2g2 /
GuideML, the Markup Language of the Guide
Title
Maybe some text goes here
Name of Link
and maybe more text here
1
Certain words such as 'red' or 'blue' can also be used
Certain words such as 'red' or 'blue' can also be used
