Question About Hexing (Newbie)

[DaRealChrono]

So, I'm picking up this hacking thing, been reading up on how to use hex editors and stuff. This is actually my first day (and my first post =D).

Anyways, I'm going through Super Mario World (U) in WindHex and since I'm attempting to make my first table I've been going through the code (obviously) and I'm noticing different values for the same "." character.

Which brings me to my question...Do these mean anything, and should I put them in the table? It appears as if the 00 hex code is for the actual "." (taking a stab there), but I see others at the different values even up to value 8D, and etc.

Also, while I'm at it, when I'm creating a table do I need to cover every single value, which would be 256 values if I believe correctly....

Sorry if this post is uber n00bish, lol.

[Maximum Potion]

You only need to worry about the letters a-z, A-Z and 0-1 and punctuation. Everithing else will be . . . . or something else anyways sine it doesn't really mater on the text side.

[InVerse]

Most hex editors display a . in place of any byte value for which a character is not assigned. (If you don't like this and the hex editor doesn't have an option to change it, you could always choose a character you like better (preferably one not used in your table) and fill in all the unused byte values with the chosen character, thus replacing the . with whatever you chose.)

If a game uses single byte character values (which Super Mario World does) then the maximum length of your table would be 256 entries, but it's unlikely that you'll ever actually use them. Unused values can be safely ignored.

According to Data Crystal (http://www.datacrystal.org), the title screen and status bar utilize a different font than the main game's text, thus you'll have to create a separate table for those areas if you intend to edit that text.

Also, if you haven't already, you might want to read The Definitive Guide to ROM Hacking Tables (http://www.zophar.net/fileuploads/2/10798icdsa/tabdef.txt) for a detailed explanation of what ROM hacking tables are and how to make them. (Full disclosure: I wrote this document, so my opinion of it may be a bit biased.)