Commit `e0aadec964`

e0aadec964e4faa14fcad919ab343c08e05512d4

parent: cd22a15611

Verified · cmc

cmc <hello@cleberg.net> · 2026-08-20 16:56 UTC

fix: update glyphs, encoding, commands, and add content to How It Works section

Layout: unified · split

content/blog/2026-08-20-nfogen.org +150 −51

		@@ -18,51 +18,56 @@ credits, installation instructions, BBS/contact info, greetz/notes, etc.
18	18	For example, here's the =bonzai.nfo= file for a patched save game for Lemmings
19	19	III, with credits to those involved and instructions to get in touch.
20	20
	21	/Note: The [[http://www.textfiles.com/piracy/NFO/bonzai.nfo][original file]] on textfiles.com contains CP437 bytes decoded as
	22	Cyrillic, so I converted this example correctly to CP437. If you view the online
	23	version, you'll notice that the box drawing and group logo are incomprehensible,
	24	which proves my point later on in the CP437 section./
	25
21	26	#+begin_src nfo
22		К К
23
24		лллллК К
25		лллллК К
26		лллллпллл лллллпллл лллллпллл лллллпллл лллллпллл ппппп
27		лллллКлллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл
28		лллллКлллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ммммммлллл лллллмлллл лллллл
29		лллллКлллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл мммм ллллл лллл лллллл
30		ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл лллллл
31		лллллКлллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл лллллл
32		лллллКлллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл лллллл
33		ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл ллллл лллл лллллл
34		пппппппппп пппппппппп ппппп пппп пппппппппп ппппп пппп пппппп
35		К жФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФЗ К
36		К ў BONZAi Ф EVERYTHiNG BUT FRiENDSHiP ў К
37		К гФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФФН К
	27	║ ║
	28
	29	█████║ ║
	30	█████║ ║
	31	█████▀███ █████▀███ █████▀███ █████▀███ █████▀███ ▀▀▀▀▀
	32	█████║████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████
	33	█████║████ █████ ████ █████ ████ ▄▄▄▄▄▄████ █████▄████ ██████
	34	█████║████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ▄▄▄▄ █████ ████ ██████
	35	█████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ ██████
	36	█████║████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ ██████
	37	█████║████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ ██████
	38	█████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ █████ ████ ██████
	39	▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀
	40	║ ╓────────────────────────────────────────╖ ║
	41	║ ■ BONZAi ─ EVERYTHiNG BUT FRiENDSHiP ■ ║
	42	║ ╙────────────────────────────────────────╜ ║
38	43	R E L E A S E D :
39		К К
40		К 9O BYTES SAVE GAME PATCHER FOR LEMMiNGS III К
41
42		К FiLENAME .............. : ........... BNZ-L3T.ZiP К
43		К TYPE .................. : ............... TRAiNER К
44		К COMPANY ............... : ............. PSYGNOSiS К
45		К CODER .. .............. : ................ SCAMPY К
46		К PACKAGER .............. : ................ SCAMPY К
47		К DATE AT RELEASiNG ..... : ............ 11-27-1994 К
48		К TiME AT RELEASiNG ..... : .............. 15:OO PM К
49		К RELEASE NOTES : ..................... READ BELOW! К
50		К К
51		К !!!!!! IMPORTANT !!!!!! К
52		К К
53		К NiCE PATCHER FOR A NiCE GAME - THiS PATCHER WAS К
54		К KINDA DiFFiCULT BECAUSE OF THE MANY BYTES TO BE К
55		К PATCHED. BUT PROBLEMS WiTH PATCHiNG TiME AND К
56		К FiLE LENGTH HAVE BEEN SOLVED. К
57		К К
58		К ENJOY PLAYiN' -SCAMPY! К
59		К К
60		К К
61		К MEMBERS OF BONZAi ARE . : К
62		К MOTiV8- SCAMPY- SUM-1- DEViL К
63		К К
64		К BULLETiN BOARD SYSTEMS : К
65		Э Э ЭЭ ЭЭЭМ NONE! SEARCHiNG! ШЭЭЭ ЭЭ Э Э
	44	║ ║
	45	║ 9O BYTES SAVE GAME PATCHER FOR LEMMiNGS III ║
	46
	47	║ FiLENAME .............. : ........... BNZ-L3T.ZiP ║
	48	║ TYPE .................. : ............... TRAiNER ║
	49	║ COMPANY ............... : ............. PSYGNOSiS ║
	50	║ CODER .. .............. : ................ SCAMPY ║
	51	║ PACKAGER .............. : ................ SCAMPY ║
	52	║ DATE AT RELEASiNG ..... : ............ 11-27-1994 ║
	53	║ TiME AT RELEASiNG ..... : .............. 15:OO PM ║
	54	║ RELEASE NOTES : ..................... READ BELOW! ║
	55	║ ║
	56	║ !!!!!! IMPORTANT !!!!!! ║
	57	║ ║
	58	║ NiCE PATCHER FOR A NiCE GAME - THiS PATCHER WAS ║
	59	║ KINDA DiFFiCULT BECAUSE OF THE MANY BYTES TO BE ║
	60	║ PATCHED. BUT PROBLEMS WiTH PATCHiNG TiME AND ║
	61	║ FiLE LENGTH HAVE BEEN SOLVED. ║
	62	║ ║
	63	║ ENJOY PLAYiN' -SCAMPY! ║
	64	║ ║
	65	║ ║
	66	║ MEMBERS OF BONZAi ARE . : ║
	67	║ MOTiV8- SCAMPY- SUM-1- DEViL ║
	68	║ ║
	69	║ BULLETiN BOARD SYSTEMS : ║
	70	═ ═ ══ ═══╝ NONE! SEARCHiNG! ╚═══ ══ ═ ═
66	71
67	72	GREETiNGS TO:
68	73	TOXiC HYBRiD PENTAGRAM PARADOX THHG G.T.A TRSI
		@@ -72,7 +77,7 @@ III, with credits to those involved and instructions to get in touch.
72	77	CURRENTLY WE ARE SEARCHiNG FOR ALL KiND OF MEMBERS.. LiKE TRADERS
73	78	SUPPLiERS.. SYSOPS.. ETC.
74	79
75		Э Э ЭЭ ЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭЭ ЭЭ Э Э
	80	═ ═ ══ ══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════ ══ ═ ═
76	81	#+end_src
77	82
78	83	If you want to browse an archive of NFO files, head over to [[http://www.textfiles.com/piracy/NFO/][textfiles]].
		@@ -95,7 +100,7 @@ use code blocks, like I did above).
95	100	One such character set was often used for NFO files: IBM's [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Code_page_437][CP437]] character set,
96	101	released with the 1981 IBM PC. This set was popular because each character could
97	102	be typed with an alt code in DOS, even if they were not on the user's keyboard.
98		E.g., =Alt + 2665= would result in the following character: =♥=.
	103	E.g., =Alt + 3= would result in the following character: =♥=.
99	104
100	105	* Introducing: nfogen
101	106
		@@ -104,7 +109,8 @@ recently. As part of this, I started using NFO files for my git repos under my
104	109	new org and wanted a tool that could help me accelerate the generation of these
105	110	files.
106	111
107		Introducing [[https://github.com/krazywarez/nfogen][nfogen]], a small Python utility that can generate NFO files for you based on:
	112	Introducing [[https://github.com/krazywarez/nfogen][nfogen]], a small Python utility that can generate NFO files for you
	113	based on:
108	114	- templates
109	115	- profiles
110	116	- configuration files
		@@ -172,7 +178,7 @@ generated by nfogen: nfogen.py -c nfogen.toml
172	178	Next, I ran the following command, which produced the NFO file below:
173	179
174	180	#+begin_src shell
175		nfogen.py -c nfogen.toml -p -o README.nfo
	181	nfogen.py -c nfogen.toml -o README.nfo
176	182	#+end_src
177	183
178	184	#+begin_src nfo
		@@ -230,12 +236,11 @@ For more examples, browse the [[https://github.com/krazywarez/nfogen/tree/main/e
230	236	* Usage
231	237	** Installation
232	238
233		The fastest installation method is to clone the repo and use the Python file
234		directly:
	239	The fastest installation method is to fetch and use the Python file directly:
235	240
236	241	#+begin_src shell
237		git clone https://github.com/krazywarez/nfogen.git && cd nfogen
238		nfogen.py -i
	242	curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/krazywarez/nfogen/main/nfogen.py
	243	python3 nfogen.py -i
239	244	#+end_src
240	245
241	246	** Generating a File
		@@ -262,9 +267,103 @@ nfogen itself works by parsing the various inputs, determining a style to use
262	267	for the box-drawing/character sets, and rendering the characters individually by
263	268	rows and columns.
264	269
	270	** Width
	271
	272	The first issue I ran into was determining the width to use. I settled on 79
	273	characters, with border characters at both ends, because X. This means that my
	274	script needs to perform some math to calculate wrapping, padding, and centering
	275	of text throughout.
	276
	277	The math is relatively simple because CP437 is single-byte and single-width,
	278	which means I can write functions that depend on that one-to-one correlation
	279	to calculate the spacing properly.
	280
	281	=_Canvas.__init__= defines a few key variables for width:
	282
	283	#+begin_src python
	284	self.width = width
	285	self.inner = width - 4 # single-column content width
	286	self.cl = (width - 7) // 2 # left panel content width
	287	self.cr = (width - 7) - self.cl
	288	self.rfill = width - self.cl - 5
	289	#+end_src
	290
	291	At a width of 79 characters, this breaks down into:
	292
	293	\| Variable \| Value \| What it covers \|
	294	\|------------+-------+---------------------------------------------------------\|
	295	\| =self.width= \| 79 \| Total line width, borders included \|
	296	\| =self.inner= \| 75 \| Single-column content, minus two verticals and two pads \|
	297	\| =self.cl= \| 36 \| Left panel content width \|
	298	\| =self.cr= \| 36 \| Right panel content, taking the remainder \|
	299	\| =self.rfill= \| 38 \| Rule segment right of the joint, =cr= plus its two pads \|
	300
	301	These combine into a cohesive 79-chararacter-width NFO file with consistent
	302	padding and alignment.
	303
	304	** Character Sets
	305
	306	=nfogen= currently supports two different character sets as outputs: UTF-8 and
	307	CP437. For example, there are =╔ ═ ║= characters in the UTF-8 example, but a real
	308	CP437 file contains the single bytes =0xC9 0xCD 0xBA=.
	309
	310	However, this doesn't really change the core generation of the NFO file. The
	311	file itself is charset-independent and the charset only comes into play during
	312	the final encode of the file.
	313
	314	Referring back to the =bonzai.nfo= file above, it was decoded improperly as
	315	ISO-8859-5, which resulted in Cyrillic characters instead of the proper charset.
	316	Defining an appropriate charset and encoding/decoding is critical to ensuring
	317	the longevity of NFO files.
	318
	319	** Banner Generator
	320
	321	The banner generator is a function by itself, which renders independent from the
	322	rest of the file and separate from the box geometry. This function defines a set
	323	of glyphs, takes an input text string from the user, and maps each character to
	324	its glyph. The result is rendered above the box and is centered, so it does not
	325	depend on the math applied to the canvas.
	326
	327	If an explicity art file is defined, this generator does not run.
	328
	329	#+begin_src python
	330	# A compact 5-row block font for the banner generator. Each glyph is five
	331	# rows joined by "/". Uppercase letters, digits, space, and [<35;44;2Ma few symbols.
	332	_FONT = {
	333	"A": " ### /# #/#####/# #/# #", "B": "#### /# #/#### /# #/#### ",
	334	"C": " ####/# /# /# / ####", "D": "#### /# #/# #/# #/#### ",
	335	# ... through Z, 0-9, space, -, ., !, :
	336	}
	337
	338
	339	def banner(text: str) -> str:
	340	"""Render text as a 5-row ASCII banner using the built-in block font."""
	341	rows = ["", "", "", "", ""]
	342	for ch in text.upper():
	343	glyph = _FONT.get(ch, _FONT[" "]).split("/")
	344	for i in range(5):
	345	rows[i] += glyph[i] + " "
	346	return "\n".join(r.rstrip() for r in rows)
	347	#+end_src
	348
	349	** Resolution Order
	350
	351	Finally, I defined a specific order to the inputs. As stated in the README, the
	352	order of importance is: =template < profile < config file < CLI flags < prompts=.
	353
	354	This was an opinionated design choice, as I felt that if you were to create a
	355	template, that should take precedence above all. Then, profiles and
	356	configurations are additional preconfigured files that require effort to create
	357	and maintain, which earns them the next spots. Finally, the script falls back to
	358	CLI arguments, if supplied, and then interactive prompt mode if nothing else
	359	exists.
	360
265	361	* The Future
266	362
267	363	I'd love to build this tool out to support more character sets, pre-built
268	364	libraries for ASCII art and table layouts, and more customization options.
269	365
	366	For now, the tool works and is sufficient for my personal use cases, so I'm
	367	content with it.
	368
270	369	If you're interested in helping, feel free to reach out!

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