Customizing Web Pages

Using Variables

Pages listed as "customizable" support variable(s) that can change the content of that page. Variables, and their values, are specified as var=value pairs as part of the URL.

To customize a web page that supports customization variables, use its URL as normal, but append a ? at the end, followed by var=value pairs. Multiple pairs should be separated by &.

Special URL characters in a variable or its value should be escaped (i.e., supplied in form %NN where NN is the hexadecimal value for the character).

Examples:

http://www.cs.bu.edu/teaching/unix/programming/?course=cs112
http://www.cs.bu.edu/teaching/alg/maze/?open=%20&blocked=*

Note how the space character was escaped in the second example (i.e., specified as %20).

Printing Customized Pages

Note that customizable parts of a web page may not appear when the page is printed (depending on your browser version).

Escaping Special Characters

If you are not sure what escape code to use for some characters in a URL (or what escaped characters in a URL represent), you may convert them below:

Remember, the ? (starting the variables section of URL), = (between variable name and value), and & (separating multiple var=value pairs) must not be escaped. Those characters should only be escaped when they need to be part of a variable name or value.

Unescaped:
Escaped: