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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 (-)

#131

Post by mmooss »

mkehrt wrote: post #21
A_D_E_P_T wrote: post #3

AFAIK most computer keyboards don't have em dashes. Rather than hit ALT+0151 every time, I've always just strung along two hyphens, like: -- Absolutely proper and correct use of em dashes, en dashes, and hyphens is, to me, the most obvious tell of the LLM writer. In fact, I think that you can use it to date internet writing in general. For it seems to me that real em dashes were uncommon pre-2022.

I always use an em dash when possible when I should, and double en dash when I can't, just because I'm that kind of nerd. But it is the case that a double en dash on iOS autocorrects to an em dash, so I'm suspicious of the claim that em dashes are a tell for LLM writing.

Why not a double hyphen, which has the same result?

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

#132

Post by ibaikov »

sandbach wrote: post #23

Robert Bringhurst¹ prefers the en dash in the context of setting off phrases: "The em dash is the nineteenth-century standard, still prescribed in many editorial style books, but the em dash is too long for use with the best text faces. Like the oversized space between sentences, it belongs to the padded and corseted aesthetic of Victorian typography. "Used as a phrase marker – thus – the en dash is set with a normal…

So much this. Two weeks ago I learned that en dashes are used for numbers, but I thought they are what em dashes are for. Em dashes for me are too long and ugly.

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

#133

Post by tedunangst »

o11c wrote: post #81
tedunangst wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is because the original was written using the wrong markup. When the output was ascii, nobody noticed, but it matters when the output is unicode.

That's revisionism. It was considered correct historically, before someone decided to unilaterally declare all existing man pages "wrong".

It's like we spent twenty years writing (mindlessly copying) web pages with &mdash and only viewing them with lynx, and then somebody makes a graphical browser and the mistake is apparent, but I don't think the browser is in the wrong.

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

#134

Post by rsch »

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 see (C) instead of ©.

It is one of those things that doesn’t really matter for readability, but although they can’t necessarily put a finger on why, people may still notice that some documents or pages appear to be set with more care for details than others.

(edit: I guess if you don’t have to search on Google what the hell a ‘Microsoft Word’ is, then you’re officially old)

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

#135

Post by dan-robertson »

harrall wrote: post #92
BalinKing wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This test feels biased by the fact that, like others have said, macOS provides keyboard shortcuts. For example, I'm only Gen Z and yet have tried for many years to use the proper dash characters in the right places, which is made much easier by virtue of being on a Mac. Of course, I guess it's entirely possible—even accounting for OS—that this test remains statistically useful. It makes me kinda sad that my (very muc…

On iPhone, type two hyphens to make an em dash: -- into — If OP wrote their post on an iPhone, they would have inadvertently appeared as an LLM by their own test.

You can also hold the hyphen key to select an en dash.

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

#136

Post by tkzed49 »

Freak_NL wrote: post #96
BalinKing wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This test feels biased by the fact that, like others have said, macOS provides keyboard shortcuts. For example, I'm only Gen Z and yet have tried for many years to use the proper dash characters in the right places, which is made much easier by virtue of being on a Mac. Of course, I guess it's entirely possible—even accounting for OS—that this test remains statistically useful. It makes me kinda sad that my (very muc…

That has nothing to do with being on a Mac. Em-dashes and the compose-key work fine on Linux, and Android has them under the '-' of the on-screen keyboard when long-pressed. (Windows probably has some way, but those are rarely discoverable.)

I disagree, there is absolutely no easy way to do it on Windows. You can install a third party program that emulates the compose key but on macos it "just works". And I think that makes a difference for 95% of users

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

#137

Post by alabastervlog »

agys wrote: post #65
alabastervlog wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, mostly the same on my US keyboard, except a couple like "@" (that's shift-2 on basically all US keyboards, and is printed on the key) and |/\, which are more prominent on US keyboards (two simply have their own keys, no shift modifier, even). I get the © symbol for option+g (which still kind-of makes sense!) I appreciate that the designer of the layout clearly attempted to make some kind of mnemonic connection…

Ah! © is on C (makes sense!)

That's c-cedille here, because to write English fluently you need to be able to type French loan words like façade—but not quite so often as someone in Switzerland, probably (especially so in some parts of the country!) so I assume you've got it somewhere even more prominent on your keyboard.

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

#138

Post by efilife »

theelous3 wrote: post #127
miltonlost wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Length of breath/pause with a longer dash. Read some -- Emily Dickinson poems – you'll find a world ––– of meaning ––– in the millimeter.

I have read her in the past and can't say there were world's of meaning between -'s. Can you link an example? I looked again and couldn't see any obvious ones. Generally she just completely abused the -. Does she even use a comma once? lol

worlds. world's would indicate that a world owns something.

Also, you can just write -s instead of -'s as the apostrophe indicates possession

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

#140

Post by efilife »

o11c wrote: post #80

One point that is very rarely mentioned is how to place em dashes around quotations marks. If the em dash indicates an interruption (not a planned pause) of the actual speech, the em dashes go inside the quotes (often just one, before the closing quote). If the em dash is the narrator interjecting with additional information, the em dashes go outside the quotes. Besides this, the question of where to put spaces when…

this is the definiton of bikeshedding
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