Re: search/replace program

[cld@xxxxxxxx (Carl Distefano)]

Reply to note from WooF  Tue, 26 Mar 2002
23:57:32 -0500 (EST)

> Be Warned, however, that the _and_ may be misplaced. Even with
> this program, you'll probably have to do some manual fiddling.

Only if your correspondents fail to observe typsetting conventions!
The program faithfully replaces the opening underscore with an
 or  and the closing underscore with an . More
than that it cannot reasonably be expected to do. (What do you mean
by "the _and_ may be misplaced"?)

> The reason is that the spacing between a word and a following
> punctuation mark is thrown off if one shifts from italic to
> normal type between them. The reader can't tell by looking
> whether the period and the closing quote are italic or normal,
> but the reader can see that the spacing is off.

So why is the punctuation mark outside the italics here:

> "Did you see the movie _Titanic_?"

but inside the italics here?

> "I did see the movie _Titanic."_

Is it a function of the question mark vs. the period, or what? Does
the rule vary from typeface to typeface depending on how the spacing
looks, or is it invariable? What *is* the rule?

--
Carl Distefano
cld@xxxxxxxx
http://users.datarealm.com/xywwweb/