Line separators
NEXT LINE (U+0085)
NEL, a C1 control that means "start a new line". It comes from EBCDIC, where it was the newline character.
- Codepoint
U+0085- Category
- Line separators
- Removed by default
- No
- Governing option
- Line endings
-n - Can be load-bearing
- No
Where it comes from
Mainframe data, EBCDIC-to-ASCII conversion, some XML tooling (the XML specification requires NEL to be treated as a line ending), and Windows-1252 mis-decoding.
Why it matters
It is a line break in some tools, an invisible control character in others, and stripped as a control by a third group. Two programs reading the same file can disagree about how many lines it has.
Before and after
A newline from another era, invisible to most modern tools.
The character is shown as a labelled chip so you can see where it sits. In your text it draws nothing at all.
When it is legitimate
In data that came from a mainframe, and inside XML, where it is a specified line ending.
How to remove it
Turn on Line endings (`-n`) and it becomes a plain LF. Note it is NOT removed by `--controls`: Ghostchars classifies it as a line break, not as a control, because that is what it means.
Is it an AI watermark?
Not a watermark
No. NEL is an artefact of character-set conversion, most often from EBCDIC or from a mis-decoded Windows-1252 file.
No connection to machine-generated text. It comes from software, from a keyboard, or from a person.
Questions
Why does `--controls` not remove it?
Because deleting a line break would run two lines together. It belongs with the other line endings under `-n`, which folds it to LF instead.
Does XML really require it?
Yes — an XML processor must normalise NEL to a line feed, which is why it survives so many pipelines intact.
Check your own text
Paste anything into the cleaner to see every hidden character it contains, with position, codepoint and what happens to each one. Nothing is uploaded.