Greek text

[+Amberel]

I would like to place some Greek text onto a cache listing. I can get a translation and paste that onto the cache listing submission form OK, and it looks fine, but when I subsequently view the listing, or return to the edit page, most of the characters have been converted to question marks. But I've seen Greek text on a TB page, so I guess it's probably possible.

 

I would like to be able to use the Greek text both in the title of the cache and in the (HTML) body text.

 

Two questions here, really.

 

1) How do I do it?

2) If and when I can enter it OK, is it likely that others will be able to see the text correctly?

 

Thanks,

 

Andy

[+keehotee]

I would like to place some Greek text onto a cache listing. I can get a translation and paste that onto the cache listing submission form OK, and it looks fine, but when I subsequently view the listing, or return to the edit page, most of the characters have been converted to question marks. But I've seen Greek text on a TB page, so I guess it's probably possible.

 

I would like to be able to use the Greek text both in the title of the cache and in the (HTML) body text.

 

Two questions here, really.

 

1) How do I do it?

2) If and when I can enter it OK, is it likely that others will be able to see the text correctly?

 

Thanks,

 

Andy

 

The only way I could do it - and guarantee everybody would see the same text - was to use an image of the text in the page description - see here

[+Amberel]

The only way I could do it - and guarantee everybody would see the same text - was to use an image of the text in the page description - see here

Thanks; maybe I can't do it the way I wanted to, then. Apart from not being able to use it in the title, the downside of this method (in my case) is that people won't be able to "copy" the text.

 

Rgds, Andy

[+dfx]

Until the text entry box on the edit listing page is unicode/UTF-8 capable, here's how:

 

1. Use a unicode-capable text editor compose your text. I believe notepad on the more recent Windohses should work.
2. Here's some random characters as example: λνξΩΘ
3. Copy/paste the text into an unicode-to-HTML-entities converter, such as http://konieczny.be/unicode.html
4. The output looks like this: & #955;& #957;& #958;& #937;& #920; (without the spaces)
5. Now, usually the output of that would be usable directly in an HTML-enabled cache listing, but since the HTML validator is still broken, you have to work around that:
6. Copy the HTML code back into your text editor and use the search/replace function to replace all occurences of "&" with the text "& amp;amp;" (again, no space)
7. The text thus becomes: & amp;amp;#955;& amp;amp;#957;& amp;amp;#958;& amp;amp;#937;& amp;amp;#920; (yet again, without the spaces)
8. Put that into your HTML-enabled cache listing. Note that as soon as you save/submit the listing, the code will get mangled and can't be submitted again. So save your description locally somewhere to a file before doing that, you may need it again.

 

As for unicode in cache names, I don't think that's possible at all.

[+Amberel]

Until the text entry box on the edit listing page is unicode/UTF-8 capable, here's how:

 

1. Use a unicode-capable text editor compose your text. I believe notepad on the more recent Windohses should work.
2. Here's some random characters as example: λνξΩΘ
3. Copy/paste the text into an unicode-to-HTML-entities converter, such as http://konieczny.be/unicode.html
4. The output looks like this: & #955;& #957;& #958;& #937;& #920; (without the spaces)
5. Now, usually the output of that would be usable directly in an HTML-enabled cache listing, but since the HTML validator is still broken, you have to work around that:
6. Copy the HTML code back into your text editor and use the search/replace function to replace all occurences of "&" with the text "& amp;amp;" (again, no space)
7. The text thus becomes: & amp;amp;#955;& amp;amp;#957;& amp;amp;#958;& amp;amp;#937;& amp;amp;#920; (yet again, without the spaces)
8. Put that into your HTML-enabled cache listing. Note that as soon as you save/submit the listing, the code will get mangled and can't be submitted again. So save your description locally somewhere to a file before doing that, you may need it again.

Crumbs! I'll give it a go, thanks.

 

Rgds, Andy

[+Amberel]

Well, it worked - sort of. It takes ages, and the 10 word "short description" blew out with more than 500 characters !

 

Have to decide if the game is worth the candle .

 

Edited to say that it's worse than I thought - you can't edit the page in any way even if you don't want to touch the text, or it goes back to the question marks - I guess you already knew that.

 

Rgds, Andy

Edited February 3, 2012 by Amberel

[+dfx]

Edited to say that it's worse than I thought - you can't edit the page in any way even if you don't want to touch the text, or it goes back to the question marks - I guess you already knew that.

 

Yup, hence my comment about saving the original description elsewhere before submitting Feel free to give a nudge here: http://forums.Ground...howtopic=288981

Edited February 3, 2012 by dfx

[+dartymoor]

It's not just the edit box that needs to be compatible, it's every gpsr and smartphone out there that's going to be used to find your cache!

 

Glad a work-around's been found though.

[+Amberel]

It's not just the edit box that needs to be compatible, it's every gpsr and smartphone out there that's going to be used to find your cache!

 

Glad a work-around's been found though.

Good point about GPSrs - I had considered different browsers, but not GPSrs. How do Greeks manage?

 

Do GPSrs typically work OK with Greek text, or do Greeks have different model GPSrs, or do they use only English?

 

And as far as the work around is concerned, many thanks to dfx for providing it, but it is so cumbersome and error prone that I probably won't use it. Groundspeak have acknowledged the problem and are supposedly working on it, but the fix has missed its release dates by some margin and as far as I can tell they haven't updated any further estimate of when it will be.

 

Rgds, Andy

[+Team Noodles]

given the fact its all dodgy coding..

 

switch to Greek interface wise and submit the text under the Greek language profile?

 

see if that works?

[+Amberel]

given the fact its all dodgy coding..

 

switch to Greek interface wise and submit the text under the Greek language profile?

 

see if that works?

I gave up and submitted the cache in English this afternoon.

 

Rgds, Andy

[+dfx]

Do GPSrs typically work OK with Greek text, or do Greeks have different model GPSrs, or do they use only English?

 

Good question! I tried on my Oregon using http://coord.info/GC25PJB and this is what it looks like:

 

 

The I figured, maybe if I switch to user interface to Greek it will show up. But even though the interface looked liks this:

 

 

... the cache description still was just this:

 

[+Amberel]

Good question! I tried on my Oregon using http://coord.info/GC25PJB and this is what it looks like:

Thanks for trying that. I didn't bother myself because I realised I wouldn't be able to test on every make and model of GPSr and SmartPhone, and that was the second major contribution to my decision not to use any Greek on the page.

 

It's no big deal. It was for a Greek Orthodox Church Micro and I was going to have a bit of fun with it as a multi, and also use ROT12 instead of ROT13 for the hint. But it's just an ordinary English multi now.

 

Rgds, Andy

[+Shiggaddi]

Well, the Greeks do suffer from a lack of "cache"

[+GAZ]

It all sounds a bit Greek to me!

[+dartymoor]

Well, the Greeks do suffer from a lack of "cache"

 

Groan!