13.16.2 Replacing high ASCII characters for W3C validation

W3C validation tests complain if a file includes any characters with ASCII decimal values 128 through 159. Presence of these characters does not preclude validation. However, if the file contains real validation errors, the W3C validator reports these characters along with the actual errors. If you fix the errors, and leave the characters, the complaint becomes just a note about “non-SGML” characters.

Note:  Leaving these characters in your document does not make the output invalid, despite the somewhat misleading way the W3C validator lists them when something else in the output is not valid.

For most purposes you should not need to do anything about the characters in question. However, if you want to have Mif2Go remap or remove the offending characters, you can set the following option:

[HTMLOptions]

; ValidOnly = No (default, allow normal use of chars from 128 to 160),

;  or Yes (for warning-free W3C validation, remaps or removes

;  those chars)

ValidOnly=Yes

This option affects the following characters:

• 128 through 159 (first 32 high ASCII characters), in all fonts except the following:

– Symbol

– Zapf Dingbats

– Webdings

• 171 and 187 (the guillemets), in macros only.

Setting ValidOnly=Yes changes the output as follows:

• curly quotes become straight quotes

• en dashes become hyphens

• em dashes become a pair of hyphens

• bullets (except those produced by <ul> tags) become mid-dots

• all other characters in the range are dropped, unless you map them yourself; see §21.5 Assigning properties to text formats.

Table 13-6 shows how Mif2Go treats characters in this range when ValidOnly=Yes. Depending on which version of the Mif2Go User’s Guide you are using to view the table, some characters might not be displayed.

Table 13-6 Characters replaced or removed for W3C validation

Value	Character	Name	Replacement character (if any)
128	€	euro	Removed
129	(none)	(none)	Removed
130	‚	single base quote	' 039 (single quote)
131	ƒ	florin	Removed
132	„	double base quote	" 034 (double quote)
133	…	ellipsis	Removed
134	†	dagger	Removed
135	‡	double dagger	Removed
136	ˆ	circumflex	Removed
137	‰	per thousand	Removed
138	Š	S caron	Removed
139	‹	left single guillemet	Removed
140	Œ	OE ligature	Removed
141	˘	(none)	Removed
142	Ž	Z caron	Removed
143	(none)	(none)	Removed
144	(none)	(none)	Removed
145	‘	left single quote	' 039 (single quote)
146	’	right single quote	' 039 (single quote)
147	“	left double quote	" 034 (double quote)
148	”	right double quote	" 034 (double quote)
149	•	bullet	· 183 (mid-dot), except in <ul> lists
150	–	en dash	- 045 (hyphen)
151	—	em dash	- 045 (hyphen) in text, -- (two hyphens) in macros
152	˜	tilde	Removed
153	™	trademark	Removed
154	š	s caron	Removed
155	›	right single guillemet	Removed
156	œ	oe ligature	Removed
157	˝	(varies; not used)	Removed
158	ž	z caron	Removed
159	Ÿ	Y diaeresis	Removed
···
171	«	left double guillemet	" 034 (double quote), in macros only
187	»	right double guillemet	" 034 (double quote), in macros only

See also:

§13.4.3 Specifying character encoding for HTML

§14.3.3 Specifying character encoding for generic XML

§21.5 Assigning properties to text formats

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