[OS X TeX] Fractional symbols

[Herbert Schulz]

> On Sep 1, 2016, at 4:00 PM, R Martinez <rm.tech at mac.com> wrote:
> 
> All,
> 
> I want to write text in my LaTeX document that includes a fraction, e.g., 3 1/2, but I want to replace the three-character 1/2 with the single character ½. As you can see, I can do it using the Mac keyboard with Mac documents such as this email. I tried inserting it in my LaTeX document but it did not typeset correctly.
> 
> I am using the STIX font package. I have scoured the zillion STIX characters but cannot find ½ with a LaTeX backslash command. 
> 
> The STIX reference document I am using is "The stix package" STI Pub Companies v1.1.1-latex from 2014/07/31. I have attached it to this email. 
> 
> The character  ½ appears in the ts1-stixgeneral table on p. 29 of the STIX reference with coordinates
> 
> 	  ′5
> ′27x |  ½  | ″Bx
>           ″D
> 
> 
> I don’t know how to access this. 
> 
> Does anyone know how to insert a fraction in the text?  
> 
> Thanks for your help.
> 
> Raul Martinez
> 
> <stix.pdf>

Howdy,

How are you typesetting the document? Are you using pdflatex, xelatex, etc?

What font are you using? If you're using pdflatex and Computer Modern try using

\usepackage{lmodern}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage{textcomp}

and then you will probably be able to generate the command with the \textonehalf command.

If you are using xelatex (or lualatex) you should be saving in UTF-8 and then, if you are using a font via the fontspec package that contains the character you should be able to just type it in from the keyboard.

In a math equation you should be using the amsmath, or better the mathtools package and then include it by placing the proper thing inside a \text{} command.

Good Luck,

Herb Schulz
(herbs at wideopenwest dot com)







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