Tech: Hash codes - browser readability?

Subject: Tech: Hash codes - browser readability?
From: Mr Red
Date: 12 Jan 07 - 08:37 AM

Hi

I was trying to advise a folkie who runs a business on the web. The suggestion was that he use hash codes to hide his e-mail address or parts of it.

It works for me - as far as I can tell. However he is a Mac (fanatic - and you know what that means - only moreso). He reckons there are browsers that don't handle hash codes properly

Anyone with any thoughts on this - particularly Mac (old OS's) owners

Maybe Greg Stevens has an opinion on TV browsers. Hi Greg - when is the Boat Band next in the Gloucs area?

Subject: RE: Tech: Hash codes - browser readability?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 12 Jan 07 - 08:49 AM

He should simply get his code W3C-compliant. Any good Mac browser will then be able to read it correctly.

Hash codes are usually Windows-specific. Use the ampersand-codename-semicolon kind instead.

Subject: RE: Tech: Hash codes - browser readability?
From: Mr Red
Date: 12 Jan 07 - 09:04 AM

I think the spammers are alive to most wheezes but hash codes do not seem to be in their radar - or not for small outfits anyways.

He has no problem with Macs/HTML, he knows them inside-out though he has never heard of the bug that locked-up the OS terminally when you dragged and dropped the clock into the trashcan.

But if Hashcodes are Windows specific then that is what he is reporting. Surely it would be down to the overall effect, a Windows only page (Mac users would not wander there) that allowed surfers to e-mail him would pull-in customers. He uses the jpeg wheeze and gets e-mails but maybe he could get a few more who knows.

Subject: RE: Tech: Hash codes - browser readability?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 12 Jan 07 - 12:39 PM

For those of us who thought hash codes had something to do with colds, they are defined here:
http://mindprod.com/jgloss/hashcode.html

(also discussion of their use, make-up and application. Now that I have seen the definition, I can forget about them)

Subject: RE: Tech: Hash codes - browser readability?
From: Bill D
Date: 12 Jan 07 - 03:45 PM

If he wants to simply not make his email easily harvestable by spammers but available to customers, the easiest way is just to put an image of it (gif, jpg) up instead of HTML.

Subject: RE: Tech: Hash codes - browser readability?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 13 Jan 07 - 01:26 AM

"never heard of the bug that locked-up the OS terminally when you dragged and dropped the clock into the trashcan"

Not vary many techies would probably ever have thought of doing that you know... eh JiK? :-)

The more foolproof you try to make a system, the better the class of fools that will come along to stuff it up...

:-)