hanging punctuation

hanging punctuation

[Werner LEMBERG]

[CVS 2003-Apr-06]

Consider this paragraph:

  The file found in "include/freetype/config/ftoption.h" contains a
  list of commented configuration macros that can be toggled by
  developers to indicate which features should be active in their
  build of the library.

Set the right margin to 72 characters and do C-u M-q:

  The file found in "include/freetype/config/ftoption.h" contains a list
  of commented configuration macros that can be toggled by developers to
  indicate which features should be active in their build of the library.

Note the hanging final full stop.  Basically, this is very nice from a
typographical point of view, nevertheless, it is a bug since you can
replace the `.' with any other character and it still sticks out one
character.


    Werner

Re: hanging punctuation

[Stefan Monnier]

> Consider this paragraph:
> 
>   The file found in "include/freetype/config/ftoption.h" contains a
>   list of commented configuration macros that can be toggled by
>   developers to indicate which features should be active in their
>   build of the library.
> 
> Set the right margin to 72 characters and do C-u M-q:
> 
>   The file found in "include/freetype/config/ftoption.h" contains a list
>   of commented configuration macros that can be toggled by developers to
>   indicate which features should be active in their build of the library.
> 
> Note the hanging final full stop.  Basically, this is very nice from a
> typographical point of view, nevertheless, it is a bug since you can
> replace the `.' with any other character and it still sticks out one
> character.

When reporting such bugs it is immensely useful if you can tell us
whether or not the bug that was present in older versions and if
so which one is the latest one you know worked correctly.

I.e. in the ideal situation the report comes with a note "this
behavior was changed by the following commit...", but even
if you don't go through the trouble of figuring out such a precise
"last version working", please tell us as much of the history
of the bug as you can come up with.


	Stefan

Re: hanging punctuation

[Werner LEMBERG]

> > Set the right margin to 72 characters and do C-u M-q:
> > 
> >   The file found in "include/freetype/config/ftoption.h" contains a list
> >   of commented configuration macros that can be toggled by developers to
> >   indicate which features should be active in their build of the library.
> > 
> > Note the hanging final full stop.  Basically, this is very nice
> > from a typographical point of view, nevertheless, it is a bug
> > since you can replace the `.' with any other character and it
> > still sticks out one character.
> 
> When reporting such bugs it is immensely useful if you can tell us
> whether or not the bug that was present in older versions and if so
> which one is the latest one you know worked correctly.

I've no idea, sorry.  I believe that this behaviour is rather recent
-- at least, I've never noticed it before, and I'm quite sensitive to
such things.

> I.e. in the ideal situation the report comes with a note "this
> behavior was changed by the following commit...", but even
> if you don't go through the trouble of figuring out such a precise
> "last version working", please tell us as much of the history
> of the bug as you can come up with.

Well, I simply don't have the time to do that.  I'm in preparation of
the next groff version which costs an incredible amount of time,
really.


    Werner

Re: hanging punctuation

[Stefan Monnier]

> > > Set the right margin to 72 characters and do C-u M-q:
> > > 
> > >   The file found in "include/freetype/config/ftoption.h" contains a list
> > >   of commented configuration macros that can be toggled by developers to
> > >   indicate which features should be active in their build of the library.
> > > 
> > > Note the hanging final full stop.  Basically, this is very nice
> > > from a typographical point of view, nevertheless, it is a bug
> > > since you can replace the `.' with any other character and it
> > > still sticks out one character.
> > 
> > When reporting such bugs it is immensely useful if you can tell us
> > whether or not the bug that was present in older versions and if so
> > which one is the latest one you know worked correctly.
> 
> I've no idea, sorry.  I believe that this behaviour is rather recent
> -- at least, I've never noticed it before, and I'm quite sensitive to
> such things.

This is much better than nothing.  Thank you,


	Stefan