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How to Use Em Dashes (–), En Dashes (–), and Hyphens (-)

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Re: How to Use Em Dashes (–), En Dashes (–), and Hyphens (-)

#391

Post by lxgr »

akho wrote: post #296
lxgr wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's one of my favorite features of macOS keyboard layouts, but it's so close to one of my least favorite ones – option + space inserting a non-breaking space. I almost never want that, and when typing "space, en dash, space", it happens quite easily and is usually impossible to tell visually.

You always want a non-breaking space before a dash.

How so? Wouldn't this prevent line breaks around dashes bracketing parenthetical statements? That's the opposite of what I want!

Re: How to Use Em Dashes (–), En Dashes (–), and Hyphens (-)

#392

Post by zamalek »

milesrout wrote: post #266
handoflixue wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> etc, actually it's "etc." (I wouldn't usually be a pedant, but if you think the difference between "--" and "—" matters, you should probably try to get the basics right too.)

Wrong. Look at any dictionary. Etc is completely fine. What next, are you going to pretend you write N.A.S.A. or Mr. White? Come on

Etc. is an abbreviation for etcetera. Correctly signifying contractions, abbreviations, and acronyms is far more commonplace than using the correct dash. Almost everyone would have learned about shortening words in high school; many people leave university without ever having heard of an em dash.

Re: How to Use Em Dashes (–), En Dashes (–), and Hyphens (-)

#394

Post by chipotle_coyote »

rmunn wrote: post #368
tines wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason not to do this is observable in your post on my phone. The spaces cause the word wrapping algorithm to leave a dangling dash at the end of the line which looks ugly. Omitting spaces prevents the word break.

I mentioned that as an advantage in one of my other comments. An advantage both ways, because it depends on preference. I have the same preference as hansvm: I would rather see the dangling dash at the end of the line, so I prefer putting spaces around the dashes. Having the entire word-dash-word structure move to the next line feels ugly to me. As with most things, de gustibus non est disputandum . (And also, quidqu…

It's the dangling dash at the beginning of the line that gets me. I see a lot of word break algorithms, including the one WebKit (and I suspect Blink) uses, which are happy to break "foo—bar" on either side of the em dash.

Re: How to Use Em Dashes (–), En Dashes (–), and Hyphens (-)

#395

Post by kayo_20211030 »

It might not be completely true that nobody cares, but I feel that almost nobody cares.

> comma, a colon, or parenthesis

They're all different. There is a difference between clear writing and typesetting. Why mix them up? A narcissism of small differences?

Re: How to Use Em Dashes (–), En Dashes (–), and Hyphens (-)

#396

Post by grey413 »

krupan wrote: post #367
grey413 wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

En dashes, I'll grant you, are pointless. Those can go away. However, em dashes are a different case. The main reason why it's desirable to use em dashes (beside convention) is for clarity of purpose. The hyphen is already a very overloaded character; they're extensively used to denote ranges and link compound words. Importantly, both of those usages do not correspond to pauses in spoken language. If you're voicing a…

Just use two dashes. Or like you said, use parentheses, commas, or semi-colons

Two dashes are fine, the other options have different literary functions than em dashes, and shouldn't generally be used as replacements.

Re: How to Use Em Dashes (–), En Dashes (–), and Hyphens (-)

#397

Post by docmars »

mmooss wrote: post #142

Here's an easy, if not always precise way to remember: * Hyphens connect things, such as compound words: double-decker , cut-and-dried , 212-555-5555 . * EN dashes make a range between things: Boston–San Francisco flight, 10–20 years: both connect not only the endpoints, but define that all the space between is included. (Compare the last usage with the phone number example under Hyphens.) * EM dashes break things, s…

EN dashes are also great for date ranges: 1/1/2025–3/28/2025

Re: How to Use Em Dashes (–), En Dashes (–), and Hyphens (-)

#398

Post by keybored »

bangaladore wrote: post #26

Somewhat off topic, however, I'm thoroughly convinced that there is a very high probability something is AI generated when I see Em dashes. Anyone else noticing this? ChatGPT for example almost always uses them. I'm sure they are more common in academic writing, but its now super common on boards like Reddit.

I’m bored with y’alls keyboard habits.

Not all though. Many people on HN use em-dashes and other proper punctuation.

Re: How to Use Em Dashes (–), En Dashes (–), and Hyphens (-)

#399

Post by keybored »

rsch wrote: post #134

Today in “typesetting before we had typewriters”: … At least we have dedicated O/0, and l/1 keys now. But we still see a lot of "straight" quotes instead of “those smart quotes Microsoft Word likes to generate”. And dashes. Did you know there is a dedicated ellipsis character? This is often set with slightly more space between dots than ..., and it by definition never wraps across a line between those dots. You still…

People have approximated ellipsis by using `. . .`.

I use ellipsis. Which ironically is way too short when viewed in monotype…

Re: How to Use Em Dashes (–), En Dashes (–), and Hyphens (-)

#400

Post by keybored »

indexerror wrote: post #288
jeffhuys wrote: post #281

I used a lot of these, but actually stopped due to my text sometimes being called out as chatgpt output. I also thorw in the occasional spelling mistake. If a piece of text on reddit/x has "–" (not "-") in it, you can be 95% sure it's an LLM.

That is an interesting observation. I wonder what percentage of the training text data for LLMs contains proper dashes, since a large part of it is user-generated content.

All self-respecting journalistic outlets use proper symbols. Where does the LLM get their opinions on “foreign affairs” from? Probably from the likes of New York Times like a standard lib...

And it shouldn’t be hard for an LLM to learn to use proper symbols when synthesizing content from the everyman. It’s not like it works on the level of literal copy and paste.

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