Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!yale!Horne-Scott
From: Horne-Scott@cs.yale.edu (Scott Horne)
Newsgroups: comp.text
Subject: Re: em-dashes
Message-ID: <65569@yale-celray.yale.UUCP>
Date: 6 Jul 89 15:08:54 GMT
References: <65479@yale-celray.yale.UUCP> <1168@atanasoff.cs.iastate.edu>
Sender: root@yale.UUCP
Reply-To: Horne-Scott@cs.yale.edu (Scott Horne)
Organization: Yale University Computer Science Dept, New Haven, CT   06520-2158
Lines: 28
In-reply-to: jwright@atanasoff.cs.iastate.edu (Jim Wright)

In article <1168@atanasoff.cs.iastate.edu>, jwright@atanasoff (Jim Wright) writes:
> 
> OK, I've wondered for a long time, now I'm going to ask.  Should em-dashes
> have surrounding spaces or "bump-up" against the surrounding words?
> 
> (1)  This might be correct --- but is it?
> (2)  This might be correct---but is it?
> 
> So which is correct, and why?

The second---by convention, I suppose.  It looks much better.  Besides, no
other punctuation marks are separated by spaces from the surrounding words.

Even if you were to use the spaces, though, you should do it thus:

	This is incorrect~--- but better than Sentence~(1) above, as
	it will never leave the dash at the beginning of a line.

In net.typing, I use two hyphens for the em dash (and the en dash), which is
conventional for monospaced text.

					--Scott

Scott Horne                              Hacker-in-Chief, Yale CS Dept Facility
horne@cs.Yale.edu                         ...!{harvard,cmcl2,decvax}!yale!horne
Home: 203 789-0877     SnailMail:  Box 7196 Yale Station, New Haven, CT   06520
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Dare I speak for the amorphous gallimaufry of intellectual thought called Yale?