[XeTeX] Whitespace in input

[Keith J. Schultz]

Am 17.11.2011 um 11:26 schrieb Keith J. Schultz:

> O.K.
> 
> You mention in a later post that you do consider a space as a printable character.
	This line should read as:
         You mention in a later post that you consider a space as a non-printable character.

> I do disagree, in the sense that, even though you actually can not see how many spaces are in a run,
> that it does have a size and thereby does have a fixed visual affect.
> 
> I do agree with you, that a space character should, in good layout, be changed to a space of white to
> accommodate good line breaking. So it is not truly a printable character in text layout.
> 
> Though, I do prefer inter character spacing a preferable method to achieve a more aesthetically look.
> 
> Know more to point.
> 
> Often enough there are conventions that one has to follow concerning the wrapping of words. Most
> prominent Names. 
> 
> As an example I will use my name Keith J. Schultz. (Yes, this is not the best example and (Xe)Tex has ways
> of getting around this) Names should not be wrap or should there not be unnecessary space between the parts.
> Generally, it is O.K. to wrap/line break after the "J.", but not between Keith and "J." so I need a non breaking space between
> them, also you do not want different space between "Keith", "J." and "Schultz", yet not the same space as used between other
> words of the line. If the "J." bothers you use "Johan" instead. The same is true of Mrs. Smith.
> 
> So the use of a non breaking space with given size is advisable for input. Of course, what TeX et al. should output is debatable
> and it wreaks havoc with TeX's line breaking algorithm.
> 
> It is often hard to get the desired results. But, the way TeX works this will always be a problem.
> Yet, when I enter a non-breaking space that is what I want and more often than not a space of
> fixed size across the board. 
> 
> regards
> 	Keith.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Am 15.11.2011 um 12:09 schrieb Philip and Le Khanh:
> 
>> 
>> 
>> Keith J. Schultz wrote:
>> 
>>> A non.breaking space is to me a printable character, in so far that
>>> it is important and must be used to distinguish between word space, et all.
>> 
>> If, for you, "[a] non.breaking space is a printable character", then
>> presumably that character must be taken from some font.  If you take
>> a character from a font, it will have a size, and although it can be
>> combined with kerning rules to adjust its position w.r.t. adjacent
>> characters,  the logic for this is fairly restricted.  In particular,
>> it cannot take into account the amount by which TeX is seeking to
>> expand or contract spaces on the current line in order to achieve
>> optimal paragraphs.  So in your model of the ideal universe, non-breaking Unicode spaces would not behave as do conventional
>> TeX non-breaking spaces (which /do/ expand and contract to assist
>> in TeX's line-breaking), nor would they conform to their Unicode
>> definition where their decomposition is defined as :
>> 
>> 	<noBreak> SPACE (U+0020)
>> 
>> I wonder if you would like to discuss these points ?
>> 
>> Philip Taylor
> 
> 
> 
> 
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