Less Than sign

Synndic · Post by **Synndic** » Tue Aug 03, 2004 10:17 pm

I've been looking for a way to actually display "<" in the label used by MQ. The problem is that when loading the UI it thinks the < sign is the start of the </TooltopReference> tag and causes the UI to fail loading.

Anyone know a way of getting a < sign to show using the MQ label for the UI?

ieatacid · Post by **ieatacid** » Tue Aug 03, 2004 10:19 pm

< maybe? Never tried it.

Drumstix42 · Post by **Drumstix42** » Tue Aug 03, 2004 10:32 pm

Someone said it not too long ago in post, but it will take (I think) the less than sign in the < form, but it won't take the other for some reason.

Cr4zyb4rd · Post by **Cr4zyb4rd** » Tue Aug 03, 2004 11:25 pm

I played with this quite a while. The XML specification does in fact allow for < and > for embeding < and >. The problem is, that this data seems to be getting passed on to MQ2 as < and > rather than the symbols being "expanded". I don't know if this is a problem with everquest's XML parsing, or has to do with the point at which the information becomes available to MQ2. To make matters worse, the XML spec "CDATA" tag, that allows for just this kind of bulk embedded "non-text" data doesn't seem to be recognized by everquest's XML parser whatsoever. Long-story-short, it just doesn't seem possible at this time, though I'd be delighted to be proven wrong.

If you're trying to embed the < or > as part of a conditional, there are some mildly complicated math tricks you can do to get things to work as intended. I'm too lazy to search, but there was a recent thread including a "target direction indicator" in a UI file that shows an example of how this might be done.

Synndic · Post by **Synndic** » Wed Aug 04, 2004 6:54 am

Cr4zyb4rd, thanks for that. I've got around the coding problems and use the directional indicator myself (I'm guessing you mean the one in the HUD?) but to display the actual character itself is hurdle so far. I did try a few days ago to use < with no success.

OK then new question anyone know a character I can use so I can point left without using a character that will conflict with XML (also a right one that matches too.)?

Cr4zyb4rd · Post by **Cr4zyb4rd** » Wed Aug 04, 2004 8:03 am

I'm guessing you mean the one in the HUD?

The same code, but somebody posted a version that works within XML files recently. I don't remember what they used for the arrow. L or R would work, or maybe

"-=[ " for left " ]=-" for right? Get creative, i'm sure you'll think of something

Sparr · Post by **Sparr** » Wed Aug 04, 2004 4:01 pm

I have never gotten < or > to work in a comparison, MQ barfs on the &*t;. If you just want to display them, then > works for a >, but < crashes the client. for arrows I used ==)- and -(==

Drumstix42 · Post by **Drumstix42** » Wed Aug 04, 2004 4:38 pm

Can you use Special Characters?

Like: » (purposely enlarged)

Sparr · Post by **Sparr** » Wed Aug 04, 2004 6:28 pm

you could, but theres no guarantee that they will be the same character in different fonts

Drumstix42 · Post by **Drumstix42** » Wed Aug 04, 2004 8:48 pm

Well, at least for the mq2hud it should work, if it accepts those chars.

Cr4zyb4rd · Post by **Cr4zyb4rd** » Thu Aug 05, 2004 12:14 am

But the whole point of this thread is that the HUD's not problematic here. You can just use < and > in the HUD, for your output as well as the comaprisons.