[OS X TeX] Keyboard mystery?

[Ross Moore]

Hello Martin,

On 5 Feb 2021, at 7:19 pm, Martin Wilhelm Leidig <listwatch at moss.in-berlin.de<mailto:listwatch at moss.in-berlin.de>> wrote:

Use smart quotes and dashes
for Double Quotes
for Single Quotes

To clarify, you probably want these OFF.

Nope.

TeX handles the quotes itself, from (double) the left and right straight quote characters.

Welcome to the 21. century.  If you want quotes handled automatically (btw getting them right for the language/dialect you’re writing in), use csquotes.  Otherwise use UTF-8, as does LaTeX by default from TL2019.

Also turn off the extended dashes, so that repeated hyphens do NOT switch automatically into the endash (twice) or emdash (thrice) UTF8 characters.

The “--” –> “–” switch gives a problem when writing TikZ or MetaPost.

Not just these, but *any* situation where you want verbatim input;
e.g.
1. computer coding in whatever language,
and
2. when updating manuscripts from past work
3. collaborating with multiple authors who have grown up in different ways.
(e.g., for proceedings-like documents)

In short, you need to be aware of what your input actually *means*,
and adjust your editing software (if necessary) to be able to handle it.

When working collaboratively, you simply *cannot* assume that all your
co-author's contributions are going to be using exactly the same input conventions.
(read "settings on their editor software")

There are many situations where your input may look correct in the editor,
but "does it produce the correct result in the PDF?"
e.g.,
the – may look correct for a minus sign in mathematics, but it just is *not*.
You want the ascii - (which looks too short) and let math mode sort it out.
UTF8 input contains many such traps.
I’m not saying to not use it — but to be aware of what you type
and make sure you understand what it actually produces in the context
where it is being used.



However, these switches are not needed anyway, because you can simply enter “–” and “—”.

If you know, yes; and have adapted your font usage accordingly.

But there are plenty of situations where this will *not* be happening,
and you may end up with missing characters – with the resulting error message
only appearing in the .log  file (*not* the console window) so is never seen.


Such editor ‘features’ are actually a nuisance; especially when you are working collaboratively.

If all collaborators use UTF-8 there’s no problem at all.

Provided they keep a close eye on the  .log  file.
But most people who learn (La)TeX in the 21st century never bother to look at that.



… mit freundlichem Gruß:

-Moss-
--
Martin Wilhelm Leidig Dante #1580
Twitter @TeXniker (TeX- und Dante-Kram), @Moss_the_TeXie2 (Kram)


Cheers.

Ross


Dr Ross Moore
Department of Mathematics and Statistics
12 Wally’s Walk, Level 7, Room 734
Macquarie University, NSW 2109, Australia
T: +61 2 9850 8955  |  F: +61 2 9850 8114
M:+61 407 288 255  |  E: ross.moore at mq.edu.au<mailto:ross.moore at mq.edu.au>
http://www.maths.mq.edu.au
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