[XeTeX] Strange behavior with right-to-left footnotes

[François Charette]

Dear all,

While doing some testing with my bidi package before uploading it to 
CTAN, I noticed a strange behavior with the placement of footnotes in 
right-to-left context.

When compiling the following sample with xelatex, the beginning of the 
second footnote is placed too far to the right. With pdflatex however I 
obtain the expected layout.

NB: Until bidi becomes available on CTAN in a couple of days (I have 
uploaded it earlier today), you can get it from 
http://ankabut.net/xetex/bidi.zip

---
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{bidi}
\makeatletter
\renewcommand{\footnoterule}{\kern-3\p@
  \hrule width \textwidth \kern 2.6\p@}
\makeatother
\begin{document}
Blabla\footnote{First}

\setRL
Blabla\footnote{Second}
\end{document}
---

But this behavior can also be reproduced without footnotes, and without 
using my bidi package. The following short sample features a 
construction roughly equivalent to the Latex \@makefntext macro. This 
probably better circumscribes the problem.

---
\documentclass{article}
\TeXXeTstate=1

\begin{document}
\noindent\hrulefill

\parindent 1em\noindent\makebox[1.8em][r]{$^1$} Some text

\everypar={\setbox0=\lastbox \beginR \box0 }
\parindent 1em\noindent\makebox[1.8em][r]{$^2$} More text
\end{document}
---

With plain xetex a similar issue occurs, though in a different way: the 
footnotemark of the second footnote is now displaced too far to the 
*left*, as demonstrated by the following sample. Again, with pdftex the 
output is OK.

---
\TeXXeTstate=1
\def\footnoterule{\kern-3pt\hrule width \hsize \kern 2.6pt}

\hrule\vskip 12pt
Blabla\footnote{*}{First}

\everypar={\setbox0=\lastbox \beginR \box0 }
Blabla\footnote{**}{Second}
\bye
---

Any idea?

Thanks,

François