Hello,
just wondering: how many ConTeXt-ers depend on ligatures such as:
'' (double quote) and '' (two single quotes) -> right double quote `` -> left double quote ,, -> DOUBLE LOW-9 QUOTATION MARK (...)
You got replies from experienced users, so I thought you could use an answer from a begginer; there are many of us out there! (...)
actually, what is called ligatures here, are no ligatures in the real sense; they are tricks that use the tex ligature mechanism to achieve something (the fi ligature came out of f + i written in sequence but nobody in the past ever wrore, by pen, three -'s separated by a small space in a row, it's was just a longer rule) (...)
I see. I also read somewhere that some font mechanisms (OpenType?) also handle what is called ligatures by themselves, is that true? What about math mode? I've not used it that much, does it also have such kind of 'pseudo-ligatures'? I read that what I use in my keyboard to type minus (-) is actually just ascii minus/hyphen, but in Unicode there's an actual minus symbol (U+2212). Does that needs special handling? The ligature trick could not be used here, I imagine. Thanks, Maurício