[XeTeX]   in XeTeX

[Ulrike Fischer]

Am Mon, 14 Nov 2011 15:09:41 -0800 schrieb Chris Travers:


> Would you be opposed to requiring an on-switch which would be required
> before unicode whitespace characters acquire special meaning?  

The various unicode whitespaces already have special meaning.  Like
"a" give something else than "b" a normal space gives something else
than a U+00A0. And like  in the case of "a" and "b" the "something
else" depends on the font: Try it eg with and without fontspec:

\documentclass{article}
%\usepackage{fontspec}
%\setmainfont{Arial}
\textwidth=3cm
\begin{document}
ab^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0

ab cd cd cd cd cd cd cd cd
\end{document}

>>> However, I would not like to think, why I have
>>> overful/underful boxes and opening hex editor to see what kind of
>>> space is written between words.

Nobody force you to use curious space character. But as input text
can come from various sources it is always possible that they creep
in file. This can happen with pdflatex too - compile the above
document: I once fighted with a curious end-of-line problem. And the
above document compiles with pdflatex too -- and gives different
output if you add \usepackage[T1]{fontenc}. 

So a package that allows you to *configure* such white space to your
needs is not a bad idea. It even can be used to show them:

\documentclass{article}
\textwidth=3cm
\begin{document}
\catcode`\^^a0=\active
\def^^a0{\fbox{!!}}
ab^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0cd^^a0

a b b 
ab cd cd cd cd cd cd cd cd
\end{document}



-- 
Ulrike Fischer