https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=154766
Bug ID: 154766
Summary: management of ellipsis variants
Product: LibreOffice
Version: unspecified
Hardware: All
OS: All
Status: UNCONFIRMED
Severity: normal
Priority: medium
Component: Writer
Assignee: [email protected]
Reporter: [email protected]
An ellipsis appears in two forms in papers, publications, and manuscripts.
1. …
2. . . .
Each is treated as a single word and is not breakable. Or, at least, they
should be treated as such. Alas, I don't know of a single wordprocessor on the
planet that manages the second form well, if at all.
The first form is embraced by the APA Style, for example, because that is the
style guide used to develop news copy (where space is at a premium). The three
dots spaced out is embraced by everyone else: MLA Style Guide, Chicago Manual
of Style, etc.
The second form is challenging. To duplicate it, writers often just add spaces
between the periods. But then, if the ellipsis needs to be wordwrapped, the
writer may find ellipses split onto two lines. It's a single unbreakable word,
remember. And so, what many writers do instead is to insert non-breaking spaces
in between.
This is not ideal. A typical novel-length manuscript to be submitted for
publication is expected to be formatted following the Chicago Manual of Style.
Now, one could do a document-wide cut-and-paste of the APA-styled ellipsis, but
again . . . not ideal. And that combination of characters, again, is not
treated as a single word (word counts, etc.)
I have also reached out to the Unicode community. They said they _will not_ add
the spaced-out ellipsis into the character set because they pick one variant of
anything, and that is that.
And so here we are. For most publications and manuscripts, we are forced to use
an old-school work-around.
- - -
So, why this bugzilla? Because a LibreOffice community member suggested that I
submit the request after I griped about it on Mastodon. LibreOffice could lead
the charge on plugging this little hole in usability. I mean, MS hasn't tackled
it. The difficult bit is determining what the correct behavior to enable
support of the most common form of an ellipsis is. I couldn't really tell you.
I look to you gurus of wordprocessing usability. It would also have to be
somehow portable when exported.
I don't know what the answer is, but maybe this will strike up a discussion.
Beter yet, maybe someone can leverage the Unicode community to see the light
and add the character. :)
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