User:Omegatron/Dash syntax

There have been several proposals for wikicode conventions that allow rendering "real" dashes — like this. Currently, an editor either needs to enter the dash as an HTML entity: —, or has to enter the Unicode character — directly by finding it in the character insert box below the edit window. Both are slow and tedious, and, despite the introduction of UTF-8, lots of people are still typing single hyphens - or double hyphens -- to represent em dashes. Other types of dashes are even worse; very few people go through the trouble of entering a minus sign, for instance.

This is my proposal for a syntax to cover all the major situations where dashes are desired. If you see a conflict or problem with it, please add to the talk page. The idea behind this proposal is to put a little context parsing into the software, so a dash between two numbers is rendered as an en, but between two characters is left as a hyphen. (Remember, you can always use <nowiki> tags to escape behavior like this.)

Syntax

Hyphen -

• text-text

En dash –

• 1912-1934
• text_-_text

Spaced en dash  – 

• text__-__text

Em dash —

• text--text
• text---text

Spaced em dash  — 

• text_--_text
• text_---_text

Minus sign −

• _-123
• 123-_
• 123_-_123

Not covered

• Minus signs between text variables: a + b − c
• Full dates, linked dates
• Minus signs inside superscripts for chemical symbols: SO₄²⁻

Examples

• Compound words are sometimes combined into one, but sometimes remain hyphenated: foo-bar.
  • Compound words are sometimes combined into one, but sometimes hyphenated: foo-bar.
• From 1923-1945, Mr. Foo frequently patronized bars.
  • From 1923–1945, Mr. Foo frequently patronized bars.
• Foos are timid creatures -- one was found hiding underneath a bar for several years -- and should not be approached carelessly.
  • Foos are timid creatures — one was found hiding underneath a bar for several years — and should not be approached carelessly.
• Foo's theorem derives a result of -3 from the equation 2 + 5 - 10, barring arithmetic mistakes
  • Foo's theorem derives a result of −3 from the equation 2 + 5 − 10, barring arithmetic mistakes

Other conventions

(See this talk page for lots of discussion and variants. The following is a summary of the major proposals.)

T_EX and SmartyPants convention

• hyphen = “-” (one hyphen: “Ex-wife”)
• en dash = “--” (two hyphens: “1995--2004”)
• em dash = “---” (three hyphens: “em dashes---those beautiful things”)
• spaced en dash = “ -- ” (two hyphens surrounded by spaces: “November 1 -- December 26”)
• spaced em dash = “ --- ” (three hyphens surrounded by spaces: “em dashes --- those beautiful things”)

Textile convention

• hyphen = “-” (one hyphen with no spaces: “Ex-wife”)
• en dash = “ - ” (one hyphen surrounded by spaces: “1995 - 2004”)
• em dash = “--” (two hyphens: “em dashes--those beautiful things”)
• spaced en dash = ??? (can this be typeset at all using the Textile notation?)
• spaced em dash = “ -- ” (two hyphens surrounded by spaces: “em dashes -- those beautiful things”)

Nathan Hamblen's backwards convention

• hyphen = “-” (one hyphen with no spaces: “Ex-wife”)
• en dash = “---” (three hyphens: “1995---2004”)
• em dash = “--” (two hyphens: “em dashes--those beautiful things”)
• spaced en dash = “ --- ”? (three hyphens surrounded by spaces: “November 1 --- December 26”)
• spaced em dash = “ -- ”? (two hyphens surrounded by spaces: “em dashes -- those beautiful things”)