Umlauts in LaTeX export

Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Richard Lawrence]

Hi all,

I don't think this is a bug so much as an unfortunate consequence of
expected behavior, but I wanted to document it here for the sake of
future mailing list searches, because I didn't find anything about it
myself.  (If someone has a better solution than the one I propose,
please clue me in!)

To add an umlaut/trema/diaeresis to a letter in LaTeX, I use the \"
command, as in:

G\"{o}del

Unfortunately, due to the fact that Org export treats both `{}' and `"'
specially, this will be exported to LaTeX as:

G\''\{o\}del

It isn't sufficient to surround the \"{o} with math mode delimiters, e.g.,

G\(\"{o}\)del

even though this will prevent Org from escaping the brackets and
converting the double-quote, because the command doesn't seem to produce
output in math mode.  (The compiled file will read "Gdel".)

So, the work-around I've come up with is to use an \mbox inside math
mode, which prevents Org from doing the escapes/conversions:

G\(\mbox{\"{o}}\)del

A bit ugly, but it produces the correct output.

Hope that helps someone!  And again, if there's a better way, please let
me know!

Best,
Richard

Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Sunny Srivastava]

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Thanks Richard,
I had the same issue! I can definitely use your solution!

S.

On Wed, Nov 3, 2010 at 11:50 AM, Richard Lawrence <
richard.lawrence@berkeley.edu> wrote:

> Hi all,
>
> I don't think this is a bug so much as an unfortunate consequence of
> expected behavior, but I wanted to document it here for the sake of
> future mailing list searches, because I didn't find anything about it
> myself.  (If someone has a better solution than the one I propose,
> please clue me in!)
>
> To add an umlaut/trema/diaeresis to a letter in LaTeX, I use the \"
> command, as in:
>
> G\"{o}del
>
> Unfortunately, due to the fact that Org export treats both `{}' and `"'
> specially, this will be exported to LaTeX as:
>
> G\''\{o\}del
>
> It isn't sufficient to surround the \"{o} with math mode delimiters, e.g.,
>
> G\(\"{o}\)del
>
> even though this will prevent Org from escaping the brackets and
> converting the double-quote, because the command doesn't seem to produce
> output in math mode.  (The compiled file will read "Gdel".)
>
> So, the work-around I've come up with is to use an \mbox inside math
> mode, which prevents Org from doing the escapes/conversions:
>
> G\(\mbox{\"{o}}\)del
>
> A bit ugly, but it produces the correct output.
>
> Hope that helps someone!  And again, if there's a better way, please let
> me know!
>
> Best,
> Richard
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Emacs-orgmode mailing list
> Please use `Reply All' to send replies to the list.
> Emacs-orgmode@gnu.org
> http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/emacs-orgmode
>

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Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Stefan Vollmar]

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Dear Richard,

sitting in front of a German keyboard, writing 

Gödel

seems to be the obvious solution for modern LaTeX and Emacs versions - you could define some shortcut to insert the appropriate Unicode character into your text (as your keyboard probably does not feature a "ö" key), or copy/paste the Umlauts from another Emacs file as necessary. If you do not need it very often, this might be a reasonable alternative. 

Warm regards,
 Stefan

On 03.11.2010, at 16:50, Richard Lawrence wrote:

> Hi all,
> 
> I don't think this is a bug so much as an unfortunate consequence of
> expected behavior, but I wanted to document it here for the sake of
> future mailing list searches, because I didn't find anything about it
> myself.  (If someone has a better solution than the one I propose,
> please clue me in!)
> 
> To add an umlaut/trema/diaeresis to a letter in LaTeX, I use the \"
> command, as in:
> 
> G\"{o}del
> 
> Unfortunately, due to the fact that Org export treats both `{}' and `"'
> specially, this will be exported to LaTeX as:
> 
> G\''\{o\}del
> 
> It isn't sufficient to surround the \"{o} with math mode delimiters, e.g.,
> 
> G\(\"{o}\)del
> 
> even though this will prevent Org from escaping the brackets and
> converting the double-quote, because the command doesn't seem to produce
> output in math mode.  (The compiled file will read "Gdel".)
> 
> So, the work-around I've come up with is to use an \mbox inside math
> mode, which prevents Org from doing the escapes/conversions:
> 
> G\(\mbox{\"{o}}\)del
> 
> A bit ugly, but it produces the correct output.
> 
> Hope that helps someone!  And again, if there's a better way, please let
> me know!
> 
> Best,
> Richard
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Emacs-orgmode mailing list
> Please use `Reply All' to send replies to the list.
> Emacs-orgmode@gnu.org
> http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/emacs-orgmode

-- 
Dr. Stefan Vollmar, Dipl.-Phys.
Head of IT group
Max-Planck-Institut für neurologische Forschung
Gleuelerstr. 50, 50931 Köln, Germany
Tel.: +49-221-4726-213  FAX +49-221-4726-298
Tel.: +49-221-478-5713  Mobile: 0160-93874279
Email: vollmar@nf.mpg.de   http://www.nf.mpg.de







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Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Jean-Marie Gaillourdet]

Dear Richard,

Stefan Vollmar <vollmar@nf.mpg.de> writes:

> Dear Richard,
>
> sitting in front of a German keyboard, writing 
>
> Gödel
>
> seems to be the obvious solution for modern LaTeX and Emacs versions - you could define some shortcut to insert the appropriate Unicode character into your text (as your keyboard probably does not feature a "ö" key), or copy/paste the Umlauts from another Emacs file as necessary. If you do not need it very often, this might be a reasonable alternative. 

Although I am german, I use an american keyboard layout for coding and
everything else. But there is a nice emacs solution to enter umlauts:
=C-x RET C-\ german-postfix RET= This enables an input method which
allows you to enter all german umlauts: ä ü ö Ä Ü Ö and ß. 

Entering an `a' followed immediately by an `e' generates an ä, followed
by another `e' it becomes `ae`, similar for ü and ö . `s` followed by
`z` generates an `ß`. Larger variants are typed by typing two large
letters.

Regards,
  Jean-Marie

Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Magnus Henoch]

Stefan Vollmar <vollmar@nf.mpg.de> writes:

> sitting in front of a German keyboard, writing 
>
> Gödel
>
> seems to be the obvious solution for modern LaTeX and Emacs versions -
> you could define some shortcut to insert the appropriate Unicode
> character into your text (as your keyboard probably does not feature a
> "ö" key), or copy/paste the Umlauts from another Emacs file as
> necessary. If you do not need it very often, this might be a
> reasonable alternative.

Also, C-x 8 " o gives "ö", as does hitting C-x 8 RET and then typing
LATIN SMALL LETTER O WITH DIAERESIS (with tab completion).

-- 
Magnus Henoch

Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Stefan Vollmar]

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Dear Jean-Marie,

this is very useful - thanks for sharing!

Warm regards,
 Stefan

On 03.11.2010, at 18:51, Jean-Marie Gaillourdet wrote:

> Dear Richard,
> 
> Stefan Vollmar <vollmar@nf.mpg.de> writes:
> 
>> Dear Richard,
>> 
>> sitting in front of a German keyboard, writing 
>> 
>> Gödel
>> 
>> seems to be the obvious solution for modern LaTeX and Emacs versions - you could define some shortcut to insert the appropriate Unicode character into your text (as your keyboard probably does not feature a "ö" key), or copy/paste the Umlauts from another Emacs file as necessary. If you do not need it very often, this might be a reasonable alternative. 
> 
> Although I am german, I use an american keyboard layout for coding and
> everything else. But there is a nice emacs solution to enter umlauts:
> =C-x RET C-\ german-postfix RET= This enables an input method which
> allows you to enter all german umlauts: ä ü ö Ä Ü Ö and ß. 
> 
> Entering an `a' followed immediately by an `e' generates an ä, followed
> by another `e' it becomes `ae`, similar for ü and ö . `s` followed by
> `z` generates an `ß`. Larger variants are typed by typing two large
> letters.
> 
> Regards,
>  Jean-Marie

-- 
Dr. Stefan Vollmar, Dipl.-Phys.
Head of IT group
Max-Planck-Institut für neurologische Forschung
Gleuelerstr. 50, 50931 Köln, Germany
Tel.: +49-221-4726-213  FAX +49-221-4726-298
Tel.: +49-221-478-5713  Mobile: 0160-93874279
Email: vollmar@nf.mpg.de   http://www.nf.mpg.de







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Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Eric S Fraga]

Jean-Marie Gaillourdet <jmg@gaillourdet.net> writes:

> Dear Richard,
>
> Stefan Vollmar <vollmar@nf.mpg.de> writes:
>
>> Dear Richard,
>>
>> sitting in front of a German keyboard, writing
>>
>> Gödel
>>
>> seems to be the obvious solution for modern LaTeX and Emacs versions - you
> could define some shortcut to insert the appropriate Unicode character
> into your text (as your keyboard probably does not feature a "ö" key),
> or copy/paste the Umlauts from another Emacs file as necessary. If you
> do not need it very often, this might be a reasonable alternative.
>
> Although I am german, I use an american keyboard layout for coding and
> everything else. But there is a nice emacs solution to enter umlauts:
> =C-x RET C-\ german-postfix RET= This enables an input method which
> allows you to enter all german umlauts: ä ü ö Ä Ü Ö and ß.
>
> Entering an `a' followed immediately by an `e' generates an ä, followed
> by another `e' it becomes `ae`, similar for ü and ö . `s` followed by
> `z` generates an `ß`. Larger variants are typed by typing two large
> letters.
>
> Regards,
>   Jean-Marie

Even better, for the OP, is to switch to the tex input method (M-x
set-input-method RET tex RET)!  In this case, you can type \"o to get ö.
Almost all TeX and LaTeX sequences are understood (e.g. \forall to get
∀, \exists for ∃, \alpha for α, \leftrightharpoons for ⇋, and so on.)
You can see all the characters with =describe-input-method=.


-- 
: Eric S Fraga (GnuPG: 0xC89193D8FFFCF67D) in Emacs 23.2.1
: using Org-mode version 7.02trans (release_7.3.10.g7f79.dirty)

Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Stefan Vollmar]

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Very, very neat - thank you!

Warm regards,
 Stefan

On 03.11.2010, at 21:08, Eric S Fraga wrote:

> Jean-Marie Gaillourdet <jmg@gaillourdet.net> writes:
> 
>> Dear Richard,
>> 
>> Stefan Vollmar <vollmar@nf.mpg.de> writes:
>> 
>>> Dear Richard,
>>> 
>>> sitting in front of a German keyboard, writing
>>> 
>>> Gödel
>>> 
>>> seems to be the obvious solution for modern LaTeX and Emacs versions - you
>> could define some shortcut to insert the appropriate Unicode character
>> into your text (as your keyboard probably does not feature a "ö" key),
>> or copy/paste the Umlauts from another Emacs file as necessary. If you
>> do not need it very often, this might be a reasonable alternative.
>> 
>> Although I am german, I use an american keyboard layout for coding and
>> everything else. But there is a nice emacs solution to enter umlauts:
>> =C-x RET C-\ german-postfix RET= This enables an input method which
>> allows you to enter all german umlauts: ä ü ö Ä Ü Ö and ß.
>> 
>> Entering an `a' followed immediately by an `e' generates an ä, followed
>> by another `e' it becomes `ae`, similar for ü and ö . `s` followed by
>> `z` generates an `ß`. Larger variants are typed by typing two large
>> letters.
>> 
>> Regards,
>>  Jean-Marie
> 
> Even better, for the OP, is to switch to the tex input method (M-x
> set-input-method RET tex RET)!  In this case, you can type \"o to get ö.
> Almost all TeX and LaTeX sequences are understood (e.g. \forall to get
> ∀, \exists for ∃, \alpha for α, \leftrightharpoons for ⇋, and so on.)
> You can see all the characters with =describe-input-method=.
> 
> 
> -- 
> : Eric S Fraga (GnuPG: 0xC89193D8FFFCF67D) in Emacs 23.2.1
> : using Org-mode version 7.02trans (release_7.3.10.g7f79.dirty)

-- 
Dr. Stefan Vollmar, Dipl.-Phys.
Head of IT group
Max-Planck-Institut für neurologische Forschung
Gleuelerstr. 50, 50931 Köln, Germany
Tel.: +49-221-4726-213  FAX +49-221-4726-298
Tel.: +49-221-478-5713  Mobile: 0160-93874279
Email: vollmar@nf.mpg.de   http://www.nf.mpg.de







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Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Richard Lawrence]

Thanks to all for your suggestions!

>>> you could define some shortcut to insert the appropriate Unicode
>>> character into your text (as your keyboard probably does not feature
>>> a "ö" key), or copy/paste the Umlauts from another Emacs file as
>>> necessary. 

>>> But there is a nice emacs solution to enter umlauts:
>>> =C-x RET C-\ german-postfix RET= This enables an input method which
>>> allows you to enter all german umlauts: ä ü ö Ä Ü Ö and ß.

>> Even better, for the OP, is to switch to the tex input method (M-x
>> set-input-method RET tex RET)!  In this case, you can type \"o to get ö.
>> Almost all TeX and LaTeX sequences are understood (e.g. \forall to get
>> ∀, \exists for ∃, \alpha for α, \leftrightharpoons for ⇋, and so on.)
>> You can see all the characters with =describe-input-method=.

One concern I have with all of these solutions is that, if I use them in
a file that is encoded in ASCII, Emacs will switch the encoding to
Unicode, and that could have unexpected consequences (e.g., with version
control).  But I have also noticed that many of my Org files (though not
the one I originally encountered this problem in) are already encoded in
UTF-8, and I haven't had any Unicode-related problems.  Are these fears
misplaced?

Best,
Richard

Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Nick Dokos]

Jean-Marie Gaillourdet <jmg@gaillourdet.net> wrote:

> Dear Richard,
> 
> Stefan Vollmar <vollmar@nf.mpg.de> writes:
> 
> > Dear Richard,
> >
> > sitting in front of a German keyboard, writing 
> >
> > Gödel
> >
> > seems to be the obvious solution for modern LaTeX and Emacs
> > versions - you could define some shortcut to insert the appropriate
> > Unicode character into your text (as your keyboard probably does not
> > feature a "ö" key), or copy/paste the Umlauts from another Emacs
> > file as necessary. If you do not need it very often, this might be a
> > reasonable alternative.
> 
> Although I am german, I use an american keyboard layout for coding and
> everything else. But there is a nice emacs solution to enter umlauts:
> =C-x RET C-\ german-postfix RET= This enables an input method which
> allows you to enter all german umlauts: ä ü ö Ä Ü Ö and ß. 
> 
> Entering an `a' followed immediately by an `e' generates an ä, followed
> by another `e' it becomes `ae`, similar for ü and ö . `s` followed by
> `z` generates an `ß`. Larger variants are typed by typing two large
> letters.
> 

There are a couple of assumptions here (and in Eric F.'s mail about the
TeX input method as well). One is that the buffer is encoded in UTF-8:
if you use e.g iso-8859-1, you can use whatever input method you want,
but you'll end up with a byte in your file that LaTeX won't like.

The second assumption (which is satisfied by default when an org file is
exported to LaTeX) is that \usepackage[utf8]{inputenc} is used in the
LaTeX file.[fn:1]

Assuming that both of these assumptions are satisfied, this is indeed
the best way to deal with umlauts, accented characters, cedillas and
the like: the buffer *looks* like the LaTeX output. But remember that
there is an encoding there nevertheless.

Nevertheless that does not absolve org from dealing with \" properly. In
fact, it deals with it correctly in a heading but not in the text:


--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---

* G\"odel

G\"odel
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

gives:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
...
\section{G\"odel}
\label{sec-1}


G\''odel

--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

However, surrounding the o with braces breaks things in both places.

I think part of the problem is that headings and text go through
different processing: e.g. text goes through org-export-latex-content,
whereas headings don't. So fixing a problem like this in one place is
not enough.

Nick

Footnotes:
[fn:1]  This may or may not be correct if you use omega or xetex or
one of the more recent TeX variants, but I don't know much about them.

Re: Differences in headline exports [was: Umlauts in LaTeX export]

[Richard Lawrence]

Nick Dokos <nicholas.dokos@hp.com> writes:

> Nevertheless that does not absolve org from dealing with \" properly. In
> fact, it deals with it correctly in a heading but not in the text:
>
> * G\"odel
>
> G\"odel
>
> gives:
>
> ...
> \section{G\"odel}
> \label{sec-1}
>
>
> G\''odel
>
>
> However, surrounding the o with braces breaks things in both places.
>
> I think part of the problem is that headings and text go through
> different processing: e.g. text goes through org-export-latex-content,
> whereas headings don't. So fixing a problem like this in one place is
> not enough.

I was recently crawling through the LaTeX export code, because I was
getting different results for how a heading was exported depending on
whether it was simply a section title or whether it was the title for
the whole document. (See: [1]) It was quite a chore for me to understand
the different code paths that a headline can go through.

I still don't fully understand why things are this way; shouldn't all
text that's exported to LaTeX be processed in the same way, regardless
of where it appears (with the exception, of course, of text between
delimiters that mark it as literal LaTeX input)?

I sent a patch [2] that basically dealt with my problem by sending
headlines that become document titles down the same code path that
headlines and content are sent through (namely,
org-export-preprocess-string), but I haven't received any response.  Is
that because there's some important reason to treat these contexts
differently?  Am I missing something?

Best,
Richard

[1] http://article.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.orgmode/32281/
[2] http://article.gmane.org/gmane.emacs.orgmode/32540/

Re: Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Stefan Vollmar]

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Dear Richard,

Nick was absolutely right in pointing out that all postings about using Umlauts in a more direct fashion in the LaTeX source assume that the buffer is encoded in UTF-8 and that "\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}" is included in the LaTeX file (org does this by default).

I have been using a "(prefer-coding-system 'utf-8)" line in my .emacs file for some time and it works well for me. All better version control systems should be able to handle UTF-8 correctly (however, I believe that you might lose some functionality when using UTF-16 or other unicode flavours as files with this encoding might be treated as binary).

Warm regards,
 Stefan
-- 
Dr. Stefan Vollmar, Dipl.-Phys.
Head of IT group
Max-Planck-Institut für neurologische Forschung
Gleuelerstr. 50, 50931 Köln, Germany
Tel.: +49-221-4726-213  FAX +49-221-4726-298
Tel.: +49-221-478-5713  Mobile: 0160-93874279
Email: vollmar@nf.mpg.de   http://www.nf.mpg.de







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Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Eric S Fraga]

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Nick Dokos <nicholas.dokos@hp.com> writes:

[...]

> There are a couple of assumptions here (and in Eric F.'s mail about the
> TeX input method as well). One is that the buffer is encoded in UTF-8:
> if you use e.g iso-8859-1, you can use whatever input method you want,
> but you'll end up with a byte in your file that LaTeX won't like.

Umm, just to clarify something: the file can well be in iso-8859-1
encoding.  It need not be in UTF-8 if all you want are typical west
European characters (umlauts etc.).  For instance, the following file
contents work just fine (I've forced iso-8859-1 encoding although I use
UTF-8 more often than not):

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
# -*- coding: iso-8859-1; -*-

* Introduction

This text includes a number of characters from España because we want
to say /cigüeña/ instead of /swan/.
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

This exports just fine to latex and org automatically includes the line:

: \usepackage[latin1]{inputenc}

I've attached the org file in case anybody wants to play with this very
small example.


[-- Attachment #2: iso-8859-1 encoded org file --]
[-- Type: text/org, Size: 162 bytes --]

# -*- coding: iso-8859-1; -*-

* Introduction

This text includes a number of characters from España because we want
to say /cigüeña/ instead of /swan/.

[-- Attachment #3: Type: text/plain, Size: 123 bytes --]


-- 
: Eric S Fraga (GnuPG: 0xC89193D8FFFCF67D) in Emacs 23.2.1
: using Org-mode version 7.02trans (release_7.3.14.g106ad)

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Re: Umlauts in LaTeX export

[Nick Dokos]

Eric S Fraga <ucecesf@ucl.ac.uk> wrote:

> Nick Dokos <nicholas.dokos@hp.com> writes:
> 
> [...]
> 
> > There are a couple of assumptions here (and in Eric F.'s mail about the
> > TeX input method as well). One is that the buffer is encoded in UTF-8:
> > if you use e.g iso-8859-1, you can use whatever input method you want,
> > but you'll end up with a byte in your file that LaTeX won't like.
> 
> Umm, just to clarify something: the file can well be in iso-8859-1
> encoding.  It need not be in UTF-8 if all you want are typical west
> European characters (umlauts etc.).  For instance, the following file
> contents work just fine (I've forced iso-8859-1 encoding although I use
> UTF-8 more often than not):
> 
> # -*- coding: iso-8859-1; -*-
> 
> * Introduction
> 
> This text includes a number of characters from España because we want
> to say /cigüeña/ instead of /swan/.
> 
> This exports just fine to latex and org automatically includes the line:
> 
> : \usepackage[latin1]{inputenc}
> 
> I've attached the org file in case anybody wants to play with this very
> small example.
> 
> 

Ah, thanks: I forgot how smart org is.

Nick

german-postfix and speedkeys (was: Umlauts in LaTeX export)

[Memnon Anon]

Jean-Marie Gaillourdet <jmg@gaillourdet.net> writes:

> Although I am german, I use an american keyboard layout for coding and
> everything else. But there is a nice emacs solution to enter umlauts:
> =C-x RET C-\ german-postfix RET= This enables an input method which
> allows you to enter all german umlauts: ä ü ö Ä Ü Ö and ß. 
>
> Entering an `a' followed immediately by an `e' generates an ä, followed
> by another `e' it becomes `ae`, similar for ü and ö . `s` followed by
> `z` generates an `ß`. Larger variants are typed by typing two large
> letters.

Hi,

same situation here (german with an american keyboard layout).
I just use `C-\' and toggle my way in and out of german-postfix.

Just one thing to be aware of: 

If you use german-postfix, using the `u' speedkey command on stars will
not work in orgmode files; I use this frequently, so being able to
quickly toggle is essential.

Memnon

Re: german-postfix and speedkeys

[Jean-Marie Gaillourdet]

Hi Memnon, 

Memnon Anon <gegendosenfleisch@googlemail.com> writes:

> If you use german-postfix, using the `u' speedkey command on stars will
> not work in orgmode files; I use this frequently, so being able to
> quickly toggle is essential.

I didn't notice that so far. Perhaps it is possible to make speedkeys
aware of input methods?


Regards,
  Jean-Marie

Re: german-postfix and speedkeys

[Memnon Anon]

Hi,

Jean-Marie Gaillourdet <jmg@gaillourdet.net> writes:

> Memnon Anon <gegendosenfleisch@googlemail.com> writes:
>> If you use german-postfix, using the `u' speedkey command on stars will
>> not work in orgmode files; I use this frequently, so being able to
>> quickly toggle is essential.
> I didn't notice that so far. Perhaps it is possible to make speedkeys
> aware of input methods?

Mhhh, not sure.

I will have a look someday, but I have no clue yet how either speedkeys
or input methods actually work.

Something for SOMEDAY/MAYBE ;).

Memnon