On 11/15/07, Maurí­cio wrote:

Hi,

TeX fonts have the known convention for -, -- and ---. How would be the proper way to get those characters in Context? Should I use Unicode characters? I know that, at least in my instalation, -- and --- work as in TeX, but I would like to know if Context has a different standard way to do that.

Thanks, Maurício

Hello, ConTeXt works in the same way as standard/plain TeX. With the "old" TeX engine(s) (=pdfTeX) that should always work. If you use XeTeX or LuaTeX as an engine with OpenType fonts, --/--- won't be converted to endash/emdash automatically, but both engines support using that shortcut if you ask them to do so (they artificially add a new ligatire to the font). So, if you're working with XeTeX and want to use --/---, you need to explicitely say "mapping=tex-text" when loading a new font, else you will get two/three dashes. If you use typescripts, [feature=defaults] will do that for you. I would say: if you find it easy to input endash & emdash directly, do that (that's what people on the XeTeX mailing list often recommend). But you can still use --/--- anytime you want. Mojca