Odd spacing phenomenon with some binary operators :(((

Peter_Smith

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Jul 4, 2009, 12:41:53 PM7/4/09

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I'm preparing a corrected version of a book for the press. It is
typeset using TeXShop on a Mac, with the memoir class.

I'm getting an irritating and puzzling phenomenon. For as far as I
know, I've changed nothing relevant in the files from the previous
version (though I'm now using an updated LaTeX installation).

Some symbolic expressions are being oddly spaced, particularly after a
binary operator like \lor or \to. The next symbol is too close and the
space that should come after the operator comes after the symbol. So
instead of getting

Fa -> AxFx

I get

Fa -->A xFx.

But it only occasionally happens. Odder still, the PDF shows up
perfectly correctly on screen: it is when I print it out that the
space-shifting happens.

Has anyone any clues as to what might be happening????? I can
correct it by hand (putting braces around the offending operator) but
I'm mystified.

Thanks in advance.

Lars Madsen

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Jul 4, 2009, 12:49:54 PM7/4/09

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minimal example please

(thoug I seem to recall to have seen this before...)

daleif

Peter_Smith

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Jul 4, 2009, 3:01:08 PM7/4/09

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On Jul 4, 5:49 pm, Lars Madsen <dal...@imf.au.dk> wrote:

> minimal example please
>
> (thoug I seem to recall to have seen this before...)
>
> daleif

\documentclass[11pt,a4paper]{article}
\begin{document}

$\{0\} \to \{y = 0\}$ \\
$0 \to \{y = 0\}$

\end{document}

Prints out

{0} -->{ y = 0} [incorrectly spaced]
0 --> {y = 0} [correctly spaced]

So: the first element enclosed in curly brackets mucks up the spacing.
Though the PDF screen display is fine for both.

The oddity is that this didn't happen with the first printing of the
book in 2007. Very very weird!

Bob Tennent

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Jul 4, 2009, 3:18:13 PM7/4/09

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On Sat, 4 Jul 2009 09:41:53 -0700 (PDT), Peter_Smith wrote:

> I'm getting an irritating and puzzling phenomenon. For as far as I
> know, I've changed nothing relevant in the files from the previous
> version (though I'm now using an updated LaTeX installation).
>
> Some symbolic expressions are being oddly spaced, particularly after a
> binary operator like \lor or \to. The next symbol is too close and the
> space that should come after the operator comes after the symbol. So
> instead of getting
>
> Fa -> AxFx
>
> I get
>
> Fa -->A xFx.
>
> But it only occasionally happens. Odder still, the PDF shows up
> perfectly correctly on screen: it is when I print it out that the
> space-shifting happens.

What are you using to print out? Try printing-to-file and check out the
Postscript.

Bob T.

Lars Madsen

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Jul 5, 2009, 9:01:59 AM7/5/09

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I'll try and print it tomorrow

BTW:

how are you printing? From which program?

Hvis LaTeX dist are you using? and which version

/daleif

Peter_Smith

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Jul 5, 2009, 10:01:23 AM7/5/09

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> BTW:
>
> how are you printing? From which program?
>
> Hvis LaTeX dist are you using? and which version
>
> /daleif

Thanks. I'm using TeXShop on a Mac, and the LaTeX dist is a TeX-Live
distribution, newly installed on this MacBook Air when bought last
August, and kept uptodate with the Tex-Live utility.

Joris

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Jul 5, 2009, 11:27:39 AM7/5/09

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prints fine for me (texlive 2008, both under Fedora and under Ubuntu;
pdflatex->xpdf->printer).

J.

G. A. Edgar

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Jul 5, 2009, 1:36:18 PM7/5/09

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In article
<79807006-005a-4ccc...@b14g2000yqd.googlegroups.com>,
Peter_Smith <ps...@cam.ac.uk> wrote:

I observed your bad printing.
I have MacTeX 2.26 and texlive installed today.

Using your minimal example (above):

It displays OK (with correct spacing) in the PDF preview on-screen
(from pdftex).
Printed from MacTeX ... bad spacing.
Looking at the generated PDF file: correct spacing in Preview, correct
spacing when printed directly.
Print from MacTeX, but "Save as PDF" ... resulting PDF has bad spacing.
Print from MacTeX, but "Open PDF in Preview" ... bad spacing.
Take the MacTeX preview (good spacing), select the formulas, Copy ...
bad spacing.
Set "Image Copy Type" to JPEG, take the MacTeX preview, select the
formulas, Copy ... good spacing.

Explain this...???!!!

--
G. A. Edgar http://www.math.ohio-state.edu/~edgar/

G. A. Edgar

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Jul 5, 2009, 1:50:20 PM7/5/09

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> In article
> <79807006-005a-4ccc...@b14g2000yqd.googlegroups.com>,
> Peter_Smith <ps...@cam.ac.uk> wrote:
>
> > On Jul 4, 5:49�pm, Lars Madsen <dal...@imf.au.dk> wrote:
> >
> > > minimal example please
> > >
> > > (thoug I seem to recall to have seen this before...)
> > >
> > > daleif
> >
> > \documentclass[11pt,a4paper]{article}
> > \begin{document}
> >
> > $\{0\} \to \{y = 0\}$ \\
> > $0 \to \{y = 0\}$
> >
> > \end{document}
> >
> > Prints out
> >
> > {0} -->{ y = 0} [incorrectly spaced]
> > 0 --> {y = 0} [correctly spaced]
> >
> > So: the first element enclosed in curly brackets mucks up the spacing.
> > Though the PDF screen display is fine for both.
> >
> > The oddity is that this didn't happen with the first printing of the
> > book in 2007. Very very weird!
>

In article <050720091336188435%ed...@math.ohio-state.edu.invalid>, I
wrote:

> I observed your bad printing.
> I have MacTeX 2.26 and texlive installed today.
>
> Using your minimal example (above):
>
> It displays OK (with correct spacing) in the PDF preview on-screen
> (from pdftex).
> Printed from MacTeX ... bad spacing.
> Looking at the generated PDF file: correct spacing in Preview, correct
> spacing when printed directly.
> Print from MacTeX, but "Save as PDF" ... resulting PDF has bad spacing.
> Print from MacTeX, but "Open PDF in Preview" ... bad spacing.
> Take the MacTeX preview (good spacing), select the formulas, Copy ...
> bad spacing.
> Set "Image Copy Type" to JPEG, take the MacTeX preview, select the
> formulas, Copy ... good spacing.
>
> Explain this...???!!!

Another strange thing. Using the PDF file produced by MacTeX (which
should be the output from pdflatex): Open in Preview, spacing is good.
Select (in Preview) the formulas, Copy, New from Clipboard. Bad
spacing. So: either there is a bug in Apple's handling of PDF, or this
PDF file is itself bad.

Lars Madsen

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Jul 5, 2009, 3:35:30 PM7/5/09

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could you try printing from adobe reader? I've had several bad
experinces with preview

/daleif

G. A. Edgar

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Jul 5, 2009, 3:46:29 PM7/5/09

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In article <4a510082$0$25198$ba62...@nntp02.dk.telia.net>, Lars Madsen
<dal...@imf.au.dk> wrote:

print from Adobe Reader: good spacing

Lars Madsen

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Jul 5, 2009, 3:56:08 PM7/5/09

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interesting, I've seen preview totally f*ck up the fonts in various
LaTeX files, so our secretaries have been asked not to save or print
PDFs from preview.

Apparently there are some filters that MAC OS X sends the file through
which f*cks everything up.

One set of notes came our using courier all over just because the file
had been save to disk through Preview.

in a set of exam exercises the line in all fractions were lost.

If anyone know how to configure Preview such that it 'works' then please
let me know.

/daleif

Peter_Smith

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Jul 5, 2009, 7:17:43 PM7/5/09

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Many, many thanks for the detective work there ... at least pins the
blame outside the LaTeX set up (as one would expect!) and gives a
recipe for avoiding future problems until Preview is sorted.

Lars Madsen

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Jul 6, 2009, 4:09:56 AM7/6/09

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prints fine for me via AR and xpdf

--

/daleif (remove RTFSIGNATURE from email address)

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