The American Standard Code for Information Interchange, ASCII, pronounced "ask-key" ('æski), is the common/standardized code for computer equipment. It was first proposed in 1963, and finalized in 1968. The standard ASCII character set consists of 128 decimal numbers ranging from zero through 127 assigned to letters, numbers, punctuation marks, and the most common special characters.

 

For me the optimal viewing distance is roughly 8 feet, which I think is about two and a half meters or so; never been very good with meters. For first time viewers a distance of 20 feet is suggested. Squinting sometimes helps. Good light is a must.

 

The Extended ASCII Character Set also consists of 128 decimal numbers and ranges from 128 through 255 representing additional special, mathematical, graphic, and foreign characters.

 

Someone once said that if you were to put an infinite number of monkeys in a room for an infinite amount of time and gave each one a typewriter, eventually they would reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Someone else has since added that now, thanks to the Internet, we know that this is not true.