r
t,
105
dots wide by 9 dots high. Vertically, dots can only be
centered in a box. See Figure 7-2.
l The minimum width of a character is five dots.
l Unlike standard characters that are restricted to a
height of seven dots, user-defined characters may use
eight dots vertically.
l Dots cannot overlap - that is, you may not have a
dot inside a box next to one that is on a line.
l You may define any position in the ASCII table, except
the block graphics area when you are downloading in
the IBM modes.
L
Figure 7-2. Dots can be inside boxes or straddle the vertical lines c
the grid.
1
If
Photocopy the grid in Figure 7-3 to help design your new
characters. We will use a tiny representation of a chemist’s flask
for our example. We decided that our flask will not be a
“descender” (printing below the baseline of standard charac-
ters), so a figure “1” is written next to Descender on the grid.
If your character is a descender, write a “0” next to Descender.
Next we calculate the vertical numerical values of the columns
of dots, and enter them underneath the grid. For example,
looking at Figure 7-4, we see that in the left-most column there
is only one dot, and it is sitting in the “2” box. Thus its vertical
value is 2. In the next column, there is a dot straddling the
vertical line in the “1” box, and another in the “4” box; its
value is recorded as 5.