Ravenheart -

The general method for coding a character in HTML is &#xxx; where the xxx is the ASCII character number. This is a specifically defined part of the HTML standard(s). Any (almost) character included in the ASCII character set can be encoded this way, and any HTML interpreter should render the correct glyph.

Some ASCII characters have been assigned "character entities," which may be thought of as "character names." These should all be correctly rendered by most HTML interpreters.

The numeric code is somewhat more general, and can be used for almost any ASCII character. Only a few characters have "name entities" like the &, ©, etc.

The ampersand, coded as & (&) is just as legal in HTML as if coded & (&).

Either method is perfectly good HTML, and should work fine in any browser, whether it's Windows, Mac, Xnix, or something else.

The HTML standards (older ones at least) do NOT mandate consistent handling for ASCII values in the range from 130 through 159, for some unknown reason; so browser rendering of these characters may be "inconsistent." For similarly vague reasons, there are no "name entities" for any of these characters either. Many glyphs in this range are duplicated elsewhere in the ASCII tables, so it's seldom a problem. As an example, the ASCII character number 155 is a "greater than" sign, but if you code › results may be inconsistent. If you code < or > any browser should render the ASCII value 60 "greater than" glyph (>).

There is nothing "Windows specific" about the &#xxx; coding. It's pure HTML.

John