Posted by Jukka K. Korpela on 05/05/07 08:43

Scripsit Joel Shepherd:

> A single giant list of 1000-45000 names is not at all pleasant to
> read, even if from a machine's point of view it's quite efficient.

Well that _was_ part of my point. Who wants to read 45,000 names, no matter
how they are displayed? You want to _search_ for names. So a search form
would work well, properly implemented. But even a separate flat text file is
better than a contrived way to rendering the names as part of a web page
organized as a sequence of lists formatted in columns. One name per line is
not a problem, rather an asset. When you see a name on one line, e.g. after
using the Find function of a browser or a text editor, it's better than
seeing the name in some column in a row where you need to scan with your
eyes to find the relevant item.

One name per line is also much better than any columnar presentation, when
_people's_ names are involved. A person's name might be anything from two or
three one-syllable words to a dozen of long words.

--
Jukka K. Korpela ("Yucca")
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/

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