On 8/13/2012 12:25 PM, Ken Whistler wrote:
Regarding another stray comment in this thread, Michael Everson said:

"The LOZENGE is also found in DOS code page 437."

That is definitely not true. Michael may be misremembering the diamond from the
set of 4 card suit symbols, which definitely are in DOS CP437.

Remember that CP 437 was implemented as rather low resolution bitmaps for onscreen display on screens that showed terminal-like appearance.

In that context, you can't distinguish a lozenge from a squished diamond (*) from a diamond suit symbol.

While the character is one a of a set, it was not uncommon to have people make do with somewhat similar characters standing in for each other. In the early years such "unifications" were, if not encouraged, then widely tolerated.

So, even if the lozenge, as such, may not have been in CP437, anyone who wanted to display one, would have used the card suit.

A./

(*) because of fixed character cells, some characters or symbols where a bit distorted to fit the cell, so if you saw a lozenge like shape you couldn't be sure that it wasn't intended to be a diamond that had be shoehorned into the character cell...

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