about typography

[Stepan Kasal]

Hello,
  more then three weeks ago, I had an interesting discussion with Benno
in private mail.  The discussion started as bug-report to bug-texinfo so
I thought I could post an excerpt of the discussion here.
(Benno agreed back then...)

Stepan

------------------------------------
From: Benno Schulenberg
To: Stepan Kasal
X-OS: Linux is het dus.

Hello Stepan,

You wrote:
> of course your patch is welcome!  Anyone willing to make the text
> more smooth is doing a very important task.
>
> I don't agree with some of your changes, but please be patient
> with us. ;-)

Ah, when humans can't even agree on dashes, how will we ever have 
peace?  :)

> Regarding this:
>
> -special meaning---they are only for the human reader's
> +special meaning -- they are only for the human reader's
>
> I believe that English (and American) typography uses the
> em-dash, not surrounded with spaces, ie. "...meaning---they...".

I thought it was just American, but on several American sites (LWN, 
joelonsoftware.com) I've seen people use the double dash with 
spaces.  But maybe they have mended their ways.  I don't think it's 
English [...]  The m-dash without spaces has the annoying habit (at 
least in HTML) of not breaking at the end of the line, glueing the 
words together whereas they precisely have nothing to do with each 
other.

> OTOH, Czech tradition is to use somewhat shorter dash, and put
> spaces around it.  So some Czech typoghraphers use "meaning --
> they", other use "meaning --- they" while the best solution would
> probably be something inbetween---a dash of width 3/4 em.
> I guess that Dutch tradition is similar to Czech which mislead
> you...
>
> I agree there is at least one inconsistency there, but we have to
> correct it the other way round.

Uhm, I'm not sure and have now not time to check, but I believe 
there are other GNU info documents that use the double dash with 
spaces.

[...]

> I hope you don't mind my critical attitude.

Not at all.  Although I hope to convince you that the European 
m-dash convention is better: it doesn't confuse the Europeans (as 
the American way does), and doesn't hurt the Americans (for them 
the European way is clear enough).

Regards, Benno

------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2004 08:52:18 +0200
From: Stepan Kasal
To: Benno Schulenberg

[...]

> [...] I hope to convince you that the European 
> m-dash convention is better: it doesn't confuse the Europeans

Speaking about the peace, I think we should allow each nation it's own
tradition.  I think it's practical if the space after each sentence
is bigger than other spaces between words, but I cannot use it in
Czech books.  And I have to use different quotation marks in different
languages.

> I don't think it's English -- at least not in "Heart of Darkness",
> the only book that's lying nearby.

Perhaps the book is too new.  Computers democratized typography, and
the non-proffesionals often make horrible mistakes.
Or it's just an exception...

Well, my experience is based on novels by Agatha Christie mostly,
and I'm afraid they are in fact printed in the US.  ;-)

Anyway, Karl agreed with me.

[...] Have a nice day, Stepan

------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2004 21:24:52 +0200
From: Benno Schulenberg
To: Stepan Kasal

Hi Stepan,
[...]
> > [...] I hope to convince you that the European
> > m-dash convention is better: it doesn't confuse the Europeans
>
> Speaking about the peace, I think we should allow each nation
> it's own tradition.

Of course, there's no disputing that.  But are manpages and 
infopages considered to be only for English and American people?  
Aren't they kind of international, even when written in English?

(And if they're international, shouldn't they follow a more 
international style of typography?  (Or am I asking FAQs here?))

> I think it's practical if the space after
> each sentence is bigger than other spaces between words, but I
> cannot use it in Czech books.

Out of curiosity: why not in Czech books?

> And I have to use different
> quotation marks in different languages.

Agreed on that, everyone their own style.  Except... in the kind of 
international info pages.  How many info pages are there that have 
been translated to another language?

> > I don't think it's English -- at least not in "Heart of
> > Darkness", the only book that's lying nearby.
>
> Perhaps the book is too new.  Computers democratized typography,
> and the non-proffesionals often make horrible mistakes.
> Or it's just an exception...

I've checked a few more books, they're all printed in Great Britain: 
the Penguins all use the normal m-dash with spaces, the others use 
a very long dash----without spaces.  Both solutions are good, but a 
normal m-dash (--) without spaces is too short, IMHO.

Benno