[Groff] RE: Hyphens and Dashes

[Steve Izma]

On Wed, Mar 31, 2004 at 06:06:46AM -0500, address@hidden wrote:
> From: address@hidden (Andrew J. Piziali)
> To: address@hidden
> Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2004 18:49:20 -0600 (CST)
> Subject: [Groff] Hyphens and Dashes
> 
>    Since we do have some professional typesetters in this community,
> perhaps you might offer some advise on the proper length hyphen (or
> dash) to use for an interjected phrase in a sentence.  For example,
> "I might state -- for the sake of emphasis -- that I am also annoyed by
> the proliferation of spam messages."  What is the proper length "--" to
> use in formatted output?  I have been using the -ms "\*-" character,
> somewhat long, but definitely sets the phrase apart.  I could also use
> "\-" (a bit shorter) or "-" (shorter still, a true hyphen).

I don't think there's a strict rule. In English typography I see
three variations:

1) an em dash "\(em" with no spaces around it
2) an em dash "\(em" with spaces (sometimes fixed spaces) around it
3) an en dash "\(en" with spaces (sometimes fixed spaces) around it

I prefer number three these days. There's also the question as to
whether the dash should begin or end a line; I don't think this
hinders the recognition of the dash's function as parenthetical
punctuation.

As a (parenthetical) aside, almost all my typesetting involves
using some sort of shorthand or XML in the source file and then
processing the file with an awk or python script that produces
the groff requests. On account of this I can always use the
shorthand "--" with or without spaces and have the script convert
it to whatever kind of dash I happen to favour at the time. The
conversion script gets wrapped up in a pipeline with groff; this
processing time is unnoticeably different from running groff by
itself, at least on anything running at, say, 350Mhz or faster.

        -- Steve

-- 
Steve Izma
    Computing Systems Administrator       (519) 884-0710 ext. 6125
    Wilfrid Laurier University Press      FAX: (519) 725-1399
    Waterloo, Ont., Canada N2L 3C5        address@hidden