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The ASCII Art FAQ

joan stark "jgs"
http://www.ascii-art.com

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ASCII ART FAQ ( FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS )

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-------The ASCII ART FAQ Ten Commandments.---------

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----
Subject:
FAQ: New to ASCII art? Read me first!
----

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

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

Answers to frequently asked questions in the ASCII art discussion groups
* news:alt.ascii-art * news:alt.ascii-art.animation * news:rec.arts.ascii

Author: Matthew Thomas
Version: 2.0
Last changed: 1998-05-10

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

This FAQ is regularly posted to the newsgroups news:alt.ascii-art ,
news:rec.arts.ascii , and news:alt.ascii-art.animation.
It is also available at the following locations:
* http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/7373/faq.htm
* http://artpacks.acid.org/faqs/faq-altasciiart.html
* http://vibes.vossnet.co.uk/i/ighaig/ascfaq.htm.
* http://www.stud.uni-hannover.de/~freise/ascii/faq.html

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Contents

1.What is ASCII art?
2.What isn't ASCII art?
3.What goes on in the ASCII art discussion groups?
4.How do I view ASCII art?
5.How do I draw my own ASCII art?
6.What should I know before posting ASCII art?
7.Can I post to ask for some text drawn in ASCII?
8.Can I post to ask for an ASCII art picture?
9.How do I get an existing picture converted to ASCII art?
10.Can I post or use other people's ASCII art?
11.What should I know about signature files?
12.Where can I find more ASCII art?

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1. What is ASCII art?

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 (0 to 127) which are standard on
almost all types of computer. The only characters used in ASCII art are
those with the values 32 to 126, which are shown below, and 13, which
represents a carriage return (new line). The other characters in the ASCII
character set (0-12, 13-31, and 127) are control codes for representing
things such as `end of file' and `backspace'; they should not be used in
ASCII art.

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 and viewing ASCII
art:

# (hash/pound):
a hash sign on most computers, a pound (Ł- currency)
sign on some British ones
| (bar):
a vertical line in most fonts, but in some it is split 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
' (apostrophe/single quote):
tilts southwest-northeast in some fonts, is vertical in others
(this also applies 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 / \
`-.,____,.-'

People use ASCII art for a variety of reasons, some of which are:

* it is the most universal computer art form in the world -- every computer
system capable of displaying multi-line text can display ASCII art, without
needing to have a graphics mode or support a particular graphics file
format;

* an ASCII picture is also 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 is easy to copy from one file to another;

* it's fun to do!

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2. What isn't ASCII art?

The following specialized artforms are not ASCII art and are not welcome in the
ASCII art discussion groups.

1.ANSI or `extended ASCII' art. Many computer systems have an
extended character set of 256 or more characters, based on the ANSI or
Unicode character sets and having the first 128 characters identical to
ASCII. These characters should not be used in ASCII art because many
types of computer system do not support them, and even those that do
may not display them in a standard way (for example, the Windows ANSI
character set is different from the Mac ANSI character set).

2.HTML art. HTML, the language used in Web pages, can be used to add
special effects such as colours, font size, and blinking text to ascii art, and
HTML can be read by some newsreaders. However, the key word here is
`some'. To many newsreaders, HTML art will just appear as a jumble of
and will be totally unrecognizable.
If you want to create HTML art, do so by all means, but put it on a Web
page and post the page address (URL) to the appropriate discussion
group. Advice on how to do this can be found at
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Studios/9334/asciionpage.htm.

3.ASCII art animated using JavaScript. This relies not only on the
newsreader being able to display HTML, but also being able to run
JavaScript. As with HTML art, put it on a Web page and post the address
to news:alt.ascii-art.animation.

Not all "ASCII" is ASCII! Certain computer operating systems use their own
specific character sets which are modified hybrids of the original 128-character
ASCII set. These "strains", if you will, have been deceivingly dubbed as
"Extended ASCII" or "High ASCII" as they have added symbols beyond the first
128. Realize that while these extra characters may seem to give you more
flexibility in your artwork, you are severely limiting your viewing audience to those
who use the same operating system as you -- thus defeating the purpose of
ASCII entirely!

Please refrain from using these special characters in addition to the 33 special
control codes in the real ASCII character set. Remaining within the 32-126 range
benefits everyone in a multitude of ways. Not only by maximizing the number of
potential viewers, but it also ensures proper interpretation of your artwork by
others and will alter the way they perceive your abilities. This is just one of the
necessary disciplines of becoming a true ASCII artists. [RaD Man]

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3. What goes on in the ASCII art discussion
groups??

In the ASCII art discussion groups 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)
heres the adress of my web site, come see it pleez (why should we?)
don't read this, this is a test
(that's what alt.test, misc.test, and many other `test' newsgroups are for)
There are three ASCII art discussion groups.
news:alt.ascii-art is the main group, where most of the discussion takes
place.
news:rec.arts.ascii is identical in purpose to news:alt.ascii-art, but it is a
moderated group -- all messages pass through an intermediary (the
moderator) who checks them for appropriateness before sending them to
the group itself. The advantage of this is that there isn't any unwanted
advertising in the group; however, the frequency of postings to
news:rec.arts.ascii is very low at the time of writing (it was resurrected in
November 1997 after the previous moderator, Bob Allison (`Scarecrow')
retired in December 1996).
If your news server isn't set up to allow direct posting to news:rec.arts.ascii,
e-mail your message to the moderator, Don Bertino .
news:alt.ascii-art.animation is specifically for discussion and postings
of animated ASCII art [see Question 12].

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4. How do I view ASCII art?

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' or `terminal' will 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 2), 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!

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5. How do I draw my own ASCII art?

You don't need a special program to draw ASCII art with. It can be drawn using
any text editor, such as SimpleText or BBEdit in MacOS, Notepad in Windows,
nedit, vi, or pico in Unix, BEd or AZ in AmigaOS, edit in DOS, or any of the
various Emacs editors. You can use a word processor to draw ASCII art, but
remember:
(1) use a fixed-width font (see Question 4); 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 4), 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.

Here are a couple links to existing ASCII art tutorials:
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/7373/dcau.htm (Daniel Au's Tutorial)
http://www.xs4all.nl/~klr/howto.html (Hayley Wakenshaw's Tutorial)
http://www.inetw.net/~mullen/asciiart.htm
(Allen Mullen's Site- several tutorials)

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6. What should I know before posting ASCII art?

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 4). 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:
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
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.

[See Question 10 for advice on posting someone else's ASCII art.]

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7. Can I post to ask for some text drawn in ASCII?

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://ftp.internexus.net/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.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 url list.)

If Figlet doesn't produce the kind of results you want, THEN you can post to
the newsgroup 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.

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8. Can I post to ask for an ASCII art picture?

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.

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9. How do I get an existing picture
converted to ASCII art?

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.

.:*~*:._.:*~*:._.:*~*:.

10. Can I post or use other people's ASCII art?

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 for your personal use. 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.

As for posting other people's ASCII art, after a discussion in
news:alt.ascii-art the following rules were agreed upon:

If an ASCII ART picture has initials on it, leave those initials on
when posting it.
If an ASCII ART picture doesn't have initials on it, mention that
you didn't draw it when posting it.
If somebody posts a picture without initials and you have an
original copy with initials, feel free to repost the original
version. The repost ought not to be taken personally, as we all
know that ASCII art often loses proper credits. Responses to
the repost are not necessary.
[Donovan]

._____________
|\===========||
| \\be polite||
| \\\\ ||
| \\\\olite||
| F \\\\ ||
| A \\\\ite||
| Q |||| ||
| ||||ite||
| a ||||___||
`\ z ||||
\ c ||||
\ ||||
\ ||||
\||||

Here is an outline for you to follow... the five levels of
politeness

1.) ULTRA POLITE:...
you make your own ascii and use it.

2.) VERY POLITE:...
You contact the author and ask if you can use it...

3.) POLITE:...
You use it but, you keep the Credits in there like
they should be.

4.) RUDE:...You use it and strip credits.

5.) VERY RUDE:...
You use it and claim that it Is _Your_ very own
creation...

[ Krogg- March'99 ]

We on alt.ascii-art would like it if everyone could be on
levels
1-3, but there isn't really a lot we can do. Please, if you
want
to use other people's ASCII Art, stick to levels 2 and 3
above!

.:*~*:._.:*~*:._.:*~*:.

11. 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 6.

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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.
Allen 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/.

Open Directory Project-- ASCII Art:
http://directory.mozilla.org/Arts/ASCII/

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

THE END
This document may be freely copied as long as Matthew Thomas is identified as the original author.

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