Good Practice With ASCII Characters

When Writing HTML Pages Find Alternatives For These Characters

When creating a web page you sometimes need to use text that the browser will interpret as HTML syntax. For example: greater than, less than and ampersand. You might also find yourself needing to use special characters such as a copyright symbol or trademark symbol, maybe even just a simple nonbreaking space point. All of these are considered special in the realm of HTML and because of this they are given ASCII codes so that the browser can interpret the correct character. Here are some of the most common ASCII codes I use when developing a client’s website:

Char – Ascii Name – Number

< – &lt; – &#60;\r\n> – &gt; – &#62;\r\n& – &amp; – &#38;

Copyright – &copy; – &#169;

Trademark – null – &#8482;

There’s also a very good chart that I use regularly to keep track of all these ASCII codes so I don’t have to memorize all of them. I’ll link it at the end of this post but what I really want to know is do you developers out there already practice this?