Monospace font in Google Groups

[Ruvim]

Some people read this news group via the Google Groups web-site, and
some even post via the Google Groups web-interface.

Google Groups shows text using a proportional font (variable-width).
But historically monospaced fonts were used in news, and some text
formatting, especially in source codes and ascii-graphics, implies a
monospace font.

I also use Google Groups sometimes, especially for search. So I use a
tweak to view articles in a monospace font.

Namely, I use the addon/extension "Stylus" [1] with the following user's
CSS style for URLs on the domain groups.google.com

div[role=region] {
font-family: Consolas, Courier, monospace;
display: block;
max-width: 50em;
white-space: pre-wrap;
}
div[role="region"] br {
display: none;
}

Having this styles, articles are shown in a monospace font to me.
Although, this CSS does not work correctly for some very old articles.
Sometimes (very rarely) Google changes the html markup, so this CSS are
corrected accordingly.


Hope this information will be useful for somebody.


[1] Stylus sources repository: <https://github.com/openstyles/stylus>
Firefox addon: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/styl-us/
GoogleChrome addon:
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/stylus/clngdbkpkpeebahjckkjfobafhncgmne


--
Ruvim

[Marcel Hendrix]

On Saturday, April 8, 2023 at 2:43:08 PM UTC+2, Ruvim wrote:
[..]

> Hope this information will be useful for somebody.

It works!
Thanks a lot.

-marcel

[Lorem Ipsum]

Sorry, I'm not following. How do I use this information?

Do you have a dummy's guide?

--

Rick C.

- Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
- Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

[Ruvim]

1. Install Stylus in your browser.
2. Open https://groups.google.com/g/comp.lang.forth/c/qW5U1xmla_0
3. Click on the Stylus icon "{S}" in the toolbor (usually, at the
top-right part of the browser window) to open its menu.
3. Under the title "Write style for:"
click on "groups" in "group.google.com/this URL"
4. Insert the provided CSS rules.
5. Check the scope at the bottom ("URLs on the domain"), and close the tab.

New rules should take effect on the groups.google.com webpages.
They can be turned off in the Stylus menu, by off the corresponding check.


--
Ruvim

[Lorem Ipsum]

I followed your instructions... I think. I did not see "URLs on the domain" anywhere. But this thread is being showing in a monospaced font. However, no other thread in the Forth group shows up monospaced and the editing window is not monospaced. Right now, this text is proportional.

I would also point out that this is mostly useful for viewing tables and diagrams people post in ASCII. But Google Groups strips out extra white space, including spaces, tabs and even new lines, losing most formatting even more than what is lost using a proportional font.

--

Rick C.

+ Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
+ Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

[Lorem Ipsum]

Ok, I found my error in the style being restricted to the one thread. I used an overly specific URL. Now this is applied to all Forth posts. I expect I can change it to apply to all Google Groups as well.

Can I choose any font that is on my PC? Is there a way to get a list of available fonts?

--

Rick C.

-- Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
-- Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

[Lorem Ipsum]

To answer my own question, I found many fonts work just fine. Liberation Mono seems to be one I prefer. I have some vision problems and this font is more distinct than others. It is kind of weird that the edit window is still proportional. But it's not unclear.

Thank you. This helps a lot.

--

Rick C.

-+ Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
-+ Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

[Ruvim]

Replace the line:
div[role=region] {

by the line:
div[role=region], textarea[jsname] {

>>
>> I would also point out that this is mostly useful for viewing tables and diagrams people post in ASCII. But Google Groups strips out extra white space, including spaces, tabs and even new lines, losing most formatting even more than what is lost using a proportional font.
>
> Ok, I found my error in the style being restricted to the one thread. I used an overly specific URL.
> Now this is applied to all Forth posts. I expect I can change it to apply to all Google Groups as well.

Yes, just click the pencil icon in the Stylus menu to edit styles
related to the current web-page, and then change the scope at the bottom.

>
> Can I choose any font that is on my PC?

Yes, just put your preferred font name at the beginning of the list.
You have to use a monospaced font.

> Is there a way to get a list of available fonts?

Of course. Just try to google:
how to list installed fonts in {your OS}

E.g.:
how to list installed fonts in Windows 10

A command line solution for Windows is shown at:

https://superuser.com/questions/760627/how-to-list-installed-font-families


--
Ruvim

[Lorem Ipsum]

Yeah, I was typing questions as fast as I got new ones, after figuring out the old. lol

I've used Liberation Mono in spread sheets when I need good alignment of columns and that worked fine.

In addition to div[role=region] {, there is div[role=region] br {, which I initially found and didn't spot the distinction. That's didn't work well at all, but I got it right and it works fine.

There's still the bug in your instructions about step 5. I don't see that either in FireFox or Chrome.

I do see a check box for "Live preview" which allows you to view the results of the changes without saving them, or closing the tab.

I wonder if there's a way to change the font color of text on web pages. Nothing else, just the color. So many web sites use such a light grey font, often on a slightly grey background, that I can't read them. Sometimes I can use Reader View in Firefox, but often it's not available.

I wrote a VHDL help site last week and they responded. But they guy says he's doing a revamp in awhile, so he's not messing with it in the short term. I really think this is one of the stupidest trends ever. It's simply about trying to look stylish at the expense of readability. Insane!

--

Rick C.

+- Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
+- Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

[dxforth]

On 9/04/2023 7:15 am, Lorem Ipsum wrote:
>
> I would also point out that this is mostly useful for viewing tables and diagrams people post in ASCII. But Google Groups strips out extra white space, including spaces, tabs and even new lines, losing most formatting even more than what is lost using a proportional font.

Checking code in previous posts, spaces are retained. So far the only
downside seems to be each time I come back to google-groups, I need to
hit Stylus button which then asks for a refresh.

It's all very clever but akin to working around poor choices that shouldn't
have been made in the first place. I fear it will only get worse.

[Lorem Ipsum]

Apparently Google Groups only strips the extra white space in the view, not in any messages. I read some of my posts from some time back, and I see extra spaces that I didn't know were making it into the messages, even after reading them after posting!

--

Rick C.

++ Get 1,000 miles of free Supercharging
++ Tesla referral code - https://ts.la/richard11209

[dxforth]

Won't be long before they'll be sanitizing posts like they've been sanitizing literature.
So offensive are names and dates, they're being replaced with "me", "3 months ago",
"18 hours ago", "9 years ago", "last week" etc. Who dreams up this stuff - which appears
to be a deliberate dumbing down of humanity.

[none albert]

In article <2fc26000-a52b-48a0...@googlegroups.com>,
<SNIP>

>I wonder if there's a way to change the font color of text on web pages. Nothing else, just the color. So many web sites use such a light grey font, often
>on a slightly grey background, that I can't read them. Sometimes I can use Reader View in Firefox, but often it's not available.
>
>I wrote a VHDL help site last week and they responded. But they guy says he's doing a revamp in awhile, so he's not messing with it in the short term. I
>really think this is one of the stupidest trends ever. It's simply about trying to look stylish at the expense of readability. Insane!

I agree wholewheartedly. Imagine they start to print books this way,
light grey on dark grey with small fonts, to annoy the elderly.

> Rick C.

Groetjes Albert
--
Don't praise the day before the evening. One swallow doesn't make spring.
You must not say "hey" before you have crossed the bridge. Don't sell the
hide of the bear until you shot it. Better one bird in the hand than ten in
the air. First gain is a cat spinning. - the Wise from Antrim -

[Ion Saliu]

Ruvim et al.:

Axiomatic ones, I am one of the Usenet pioneers. For convenience, I chose Google Groups for reading and posting in newsgroups.

The biggest problem I and others faced was the formatting of reports. They were ASCII (text) files in the ubiquitous Courier font type. Viewing the well-formatted text files was a serious challenge. The entries were not aligned and the entire report looked meaningless. I know it first-hand since I published numerous lottery reports. We recommended copy-and-paste to Notepad for better viewing. Still, it didn’t work well!

I was referred to this very thread by a poster in rec.gambling.lottery. Accordingly, I felt compelled to install Stylus in Chrome, Firefox, and, yes, Edge. I detailed the installation and running of Stylus for others to follow. I posted special threads in several newsgroups I am a member of. I decided to publish the same “instructions” here.

• https://groups.google.com/g/rec.gambling.lottery/c/xj1oUsXz5oo?hl=en
• Usenet Redivivus! Best Post Viewing in Google Groups

CHROME:
• In Tools on the toolbar, click More tools, then Extensions. Click the 3-bar button at the top left to open the Extensions menu; at the bottom, click ‘Open Chrome Web Store’. In ‘Search the store’, type Stylus. Click on app’s name to add to Chrome.
• After installation, click on the Extensions button on Toolbar, click on Stylus, then Pin to toolbar.

FIREFOX:
• In Tools on the toolbar, click Addon and tools, Extensions (in the left panel), Find more addons, search for Stylus; in Search results, click on Stylus, then Add to Firefox.
• After installation, click on the Extensions button on Toolbar, click on Stylus, then Pin to toolbar.

EDGE:
• Stylus does not appear in the Edge browser’s Extensions.
• In the ‘Extensions’ function, scroll to the bottom: ‘Find new extensions’.
• Look for: “Can't find what you're looking for? You can also get extensions from the Chrome Web Store.” Download and install Stylus as in the Chrome browser.

How to configure Stylus

1.– Open a Google group in the Chrome / Edge or Firefox browser. For example, the address bar should read https://groups.google.com/g/rec.gambling.lottery
2.– Click the Stylus button on the toolbar (e.g. S in a square)
3.– Check the option box ‘Write style for’
4.– The U button appears; e.g. groups.google.com/This URL
5.– Click on the URL (it should be HTML-activated)
6.– Go to the bottom section that reads ‘URLs on this domain’
7.– Copy-and-paste the following code snippet (overwrite lines 9, 10, 11):

div[role=region] {
font-family: Consolas, Courier, monospace;
display: block;

max-width: 80em;

white-space: pre-wrap;
}
div[role="region"] br {
display: none;
}

8.– You see the code you copied was moved up to the section ‘/* ==UserStyle==’
9.– Click Save in the left panel (‘Add Style’)
10.– Close the window/tab (e.g. https://groups.google.com/g/rec.gambling.lottery )
11.– Reopen the window/tab; the new viewing style is in effect.

The personal computing, including good ol’ 16-bit DOS, had 80 columns. That is, the maximum width was 80 characters in a monospaced font. Many reports in the early days of Usenet were created for an 80-column screen. We can resort to that width by changing the max-width: 50em; line to 80 characters horizontally.

I subscribe to several Google groups. I notice that adding Stylus to one newsgroup automatically changes the viewing to monospace in ALL my favorite groups.

Heads-up –
I noticed Stylus changes the appearance (font type) of websites other than newsgroups. Curiously, my webmail looks different with some accounts. I can’t see the messages in my Inbox with the old Hotmail via Outlook. I simply disable Stylus. I click the ‘green’ button on the toolbar. I check the box ‘Turn all styles off’. The button turns ‘red’. When I navigate to a newsgroup, I uncheck the same box; the button turns ‘green’ again.

May Usenet live forever!


Ion “Axiomatic Parpaluck” Saliu
Intelligently At-Large (both naturally and artificially)
• https://saliu.com/ai-chatbots-ion-saliu.html
• Artificial Intelligence, AI Chatbots, Ion Saliu, Newton, Einstein

[Ion Saliu]

Stylus makes such a big difference!

Here is a statistical report created for an 80-column screen. It looks SOOO clear in Stylus compared to the proportional-font screen you were used to! Just turn the app ON, then OFF on the toolbar. In this particular case, it works alright with copy-and-paste to Notepad. But why the extra operation? Not to mention that it doesn’t work all the time.

Lotto 5 / 43 Report: DECADES & LAST-DIGITS
File: PA-5; Date: 07-17-2015
Draws Analyzed: 1000

The numbers in each column in the DEC area show how many numbers from the DECADE listed in the header came out
in the corresponding drawing. The numbers in the 2nd area show the distribution of the LAST DIGIT for every number
in the lotto draw; e.g. 20 has last digit 0; lotto #1 has 1 as last digit, lotto #43 has 3 as last digit, etc.

D E C A D E S Total L A S T D I G I T S Total
Line Draw Dec Dec Dec Dec Dec Dec combos Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig combos
no ings 1-9 10-19 20-29 30-39 40-49 50-59 DEC 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 DIG

1 9 11 14 23 28 1 2+ 2+ 0- 0- 0 18225 0 1 0- 1+ 1+ 0 0- 0- 1+ 1+ 1600
2 7 26 32 41 42 1- 0- 1 1+ 2+ 0 5400 0 1 2+ 0 0- 0 1+ 1 0 0 800
3 1 2 7 14 24 3+ 1- 1 0 0 0 8400 0 1+ 1 0 2+ 0 0- 1 0 0- 600
4 6 9 17 19 22 2 2+ 1+ 0- 0- 0 16200 0 0- 1- 0- 0 0 1 1+ 0 2+ 480
5 2 3 31 36 42 2 0 0- 2 1+ 0 6480 0 1 2+ 1+ 0 0 1- 0- 0 0- 1000
6 7 9 26 31 36 2 0 1+ 2- 0 0 16200 0- 1+ 0 0 0- 0 2+ 1+ 0- 1- 480
7 4 9 30 38 39 2 0- 0- 3+ 0 0 4320 1 0 0 0- 1+ 0 0- 0 1+ 2+ 384
8 3 9 10 23 36 2+ 1- 1+ 1- 0 0 36000 1+ 0- 0- 2+ 0- 0 1+ 0 0 1+ 640
9 12 13 14 31 32 0 3+ 0- 2+ 0- 0 5400 0 1 2+ 1- 1+ 0 0 0 0- 0 1000
10 13 22 23 38 41 0 1- 2 1+ 1 0 18000 0 1 1 2+ 0- 0 0 0 1+ 0 1000
11 12 14 21 24 43 0- 2 2+ 0- 1+ 0 8100 0 1 1 1+ 2+ 0 0 0- 0 0- 750
12 9 12 19 21 37 1+ 2+ 1- 1 0- 0 40500 0 1 1 0 0 0- 0 1 0- 2+ 600
13 17 25 28 31 42 0 1 2- 1 1+ 0 18000 0 1 1 0- 0- 1+ 0 1 1+ 0 1600
...