Is it lunedì or lunedí in Italian?

Lunedì, with the grave accent. Standard Italian puts a grave on a stressed final i, as in così and lunedì, and the capitals follow: COSÌ, LUNEDÌ. A few publishers set í with an acute instead, but dictionaries and the Italian keyboard's ì key go with the grave, so that's the spelling search and spell checkers expect.

Why does Alt+0204 give Ì when I want ╠?

The zero switches Alt codes to Windows-1252, where 204 is Ì. Box pieces only exist in the DOS table, so leave the zero off: Alt+204 types ╠ in Notepad and most other Windows apps. The rest of the double-line set works the same way, from Alt+185 for ╣ to Alt+205 for ═.

Why does emoji inside my ╠═╣ frame push the edge out?

Because an emoji or a CJK character fills two terminal columns but counts as one character, so padding by len() leaves the row one column too long for each wide character. Pad by display width instead: in Python, `wcwidth.wcswidth(text)` from the wcwidth package returns the columns a string really takes, and the ║ and ╣ line up again.

ASCII 204

Uppercase I with grave accentDouble box T-junction pointing right

ASCII 204 is Ì on Windows and ╠ in old DOS.

Ì (Capital I with Grave) is byte 204 in Windows-1252, Unicode U+00CC. It appears in Italian text set in capitals, like COSÌ or the weekday LUNEDÌ, and Vietnamese uses it as the capital of ì, the i with a falling tone. UTF-8 stores it as C3 8C, and 8C is the ligature Œ in Windows-1252, so mangled capitals read COSÃŒ, as if a French ligature had slipped into the Italian. The HTML entity is Ì.

╠ (Double Vertical and Right) is byte 204 in code page 437, the original IBM PC character set, and maps to Unicode U+2560. It's the tee on the left side of an all-double frame, and with ═ (205) and ╣ (185) it draws a full double divider, ╠════╣. If you put frames like this on a web page, a screen reader gets only a string of symbols, not a box. Mark decorative box art with aria-hidden='true' and give the actual content in plain text or a real HTML table. In UTF-8 it's E2 95 A0, and the HTML entity is &boxVR;.

Latin LetterBox Drawing

Technical Details

Code Example

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#include <stdio.h>

int main(void) {
    /* On Windows (code page 1252) byte 204 is Ì.
       Modern terminals expect UTF-8, so print the code point, not the byte. */
    printf("\u00CC\n");   /* UTF-8: C3 8C */

    unsigned char b = 204;         /* the raw Windows-1252 byte */
    printf("%d 0x%02X\n", b, b);    /* 204 0xCC */
    return 0;
}

Code Example

</>

#include <stdio.h>

int main(void) {
    /* Byte 204 is ╠ only on a console using code page 437
       (chcp 437 on Windows, or DOSBox). On a UTF-8 terminal the
       lone byte 0xCC is invalid and prints as garbage, often �. */
    putchar(204);

    /* char is signed on x86, so a plain char holding 0xCC is -52.
       Use unsigned char when you compare or index by byte value. */
    char c = (char)204;
    unsigned char u = 204;
    printf("\n%d %d\n", c, u);   /* -52 204 */

    /* Portable: print the Unicode character as UTF-8 instead. */
    printf("\u2560\n");          /* E2 95 A0 */
    return 0;
}

How to Type It

Windows: Hold Alt and type 0204 on the numeric keypad, with Num Lock on. The leading zero picks the Windows code page. No numeric keypad? In Word, type 00CC and press Alt+X.
Mac: Press Option+`, then Shift+I.
Linux: In GNOME, or any desktop running IBus, press Ctrl+Shift+U, type cc, then Space. With a Compose key set up, press Compose, backtick, I.
Phone: Tap Shift, then long-press I and pick Ì.

How to Type It

Windows: Hold Alt and type 204 on the numeric keypad, with no leading zero. Windows reads it as a DOS code and inserts ╠. No numeric keypad? In Word, type 2560 and press Alt+X.
Mac: Press Control+Command+Space to open the Character Viewer, then search for "box drawings double vertical and right".
Linux: In GNOME, or any desktop running IBus, press Ctrl+Shift+U, type 2560, then Space.
Phone: Phone keyboards have no key for it. Tap the character at the top of this page to copy it.

Frequently Asked Questions

Lunedì, with the grave accent. Standard Italian puts a grave on a stressed final i, as in così and lunedì, and the capitals follow: COSÌ, LUNEDÌ. A few publishers set í with an acute instead, but dictionaries and the Italian keyboard's ì key go with the grave, so that's the spelling search and spell checkers expect.

Frequently Asked Questions

The zero switches Alt codes to Windows-1252, where 204 is Ì. Box pieces only exist in the DOS table, so leave the zero off: Alt+204 types ╠ in Notepad and most other Windows apps. The rest of the double-line set works the same way, from Alt+185 for ╣ to Alt+205 for ═.
Because an emoji or a CJK character fills two terminal columns but counts as one character, so padding by len() leaves the row one column too long for each wide character. Pad by display width instead: in Python, `wcwidth.wcswidth(text)` from the wcwidth package returns the columns a string really takes, and the ║ and ╣ line up again.

ASCII 204

Uppercase I with grave accentDouble box T-junction pointing right

ASCII 204 is Ì on Windows and ╠ in old DOS.

Latin Letter

Box Drawing

#include <stdio.h>

int main(void) {

/* On Windows (code page 1252) byte 204 is Ì.

Modern terminals expect UTF-8, so print the code point, not the byte. */

printf("\u00CC\n"); /* UTF-8: C3 8C */

unsigned char b = 204; /* the raw Windows-1252 byte */

printf("%d 0x%02X\n", b, b); /* 204 0xCC */

return 0;

}

#include <stdio.h>

int main(void) {

/* Byte 204 is ╠ only on a console using code page 437

(chcp 437 on Windows, or DOSBox). On a UTF-8 terminal the

lone byte 0xCC is invalid and prints as garbage, often �. */

putchar(204);

/* char is signed on x86, so a plain char holding 0xCC is -52.

Use unsigned char when you compare or index by byte value. */

char c = (char)204;

unsigned char u = 204;

printf("\n%d %d\n", c, u); /* -52 204 */

/* Portable: print the Unicode character as UTF-8 instead. */

printf("\u2560\n"); /* E2 95 A0 */

return 0;

}