1. posterid:11621
  2. question about carriage returns vs line feeds in NVDA

Re: question about carriage returns vs line feeds in NVDA

Mohamed
 

Interestingly, NVDA seems to report them differently depending on how you come across the character. For example, if you enter a new line and erase it in Notepad, it gets reported as "Line feed", but arrowing to it results in "Carriage return". Is it possible that Windows may be reporting it differently depending on the case?

On 9/4/2017 8:24 AM, Antony Stone wrote:
Yes, there is a difference between the two, and it matters when sending files
between different types of computers.

Windows uses simply Carriage Return (hex code 0d) to indicate end of line.

Macintosh computers used to use just Line Feed (hex code 0a); I don't know
whether this changed when they migrated from MacOS to OSX.

Linux and Unix computers use both together, so the hex code is 0d 0a, to
indicate end of line.

The reason for the two codes is historical - teletypes and printers used one
code to mean "return the print head to the start of the line" (that's Carriage
Return), and the other to mean "move the paper up one line" (that's line
feed).

This made it possible to print a line, return to the start without moving the
paper, and then print again over the top of the first line, used for creating
bold print, composite characters, etc.


Regards,


Antony.

On Monday 04 September 2017 at 12:56:22, Mohamed wrote:

Hi, I noticed that, depending on the text editor in use at the time,
NVDA will sometimes say either "carriage return" or "Line feed" to
indicate new lines. Since they seem to serve similar purposes, I wonder
if there is actually a difference between the two?
Thanks.
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