[Plugin] PunctuationSmarten Sigil plugin

[DiapDealer]

Your suggestion of '\d\d[^0-9'] is not a bad one. There might be some things that fall through the cracks when the British style of single-quotes is employed, but they were going to be wrongly interpreted under the old rule too.

Give this beta version a workout. There's only three lines changed from version 0.3.3 of the plugin (lines 631-633 of newsmartypants.py), and two of those are comments.

[Thomas_AR]

Folks, just one more question.
I know this plugin works best in English books. As i am mostly working with German Books is there an adapted plugin as some signs are very different. Or is it language independent.

Thanks and sorry for the noop question

Thomas

[DiapDealer]

To be honest, this plugin is basically just a wrapper around someone else's work: the SmartyPants Python smartening algorithm (which was nowhere near perfect--or even complete--in the first place). I've just tweaked it where I can. I would say that SmartyPants is definitely English-centric.

There may be some language specific (or agnostic) smartening algorithms out there, but I've not run into them.

[AlanHK]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Give this beta version a workout.

Yep, that works.


<p>Month '1' in '84 was a good year. He had a '317' average and solved the '3 body problem'.</p>

to

<p>Month ‘1’ in ’84 was a good year. He had a ‘317’ average and solved the ‘3 body problem’. </p>


I see the previous version checked for '80s and '90s, etc. But not particular years.

There are some cases that fail: A '12-gauge shotgun'. But 'NN years are much more common.


When you update it, you could include the plugin.png icon.
If you don't have one, here's the one I use, found in another thread a while ago.

[thosp]

Greetings,

I use this in Sigil to 'correct' files downloaded form ... everywhere. Recently, I noticed a perceived problem.

The file in question had this, " -- " or {[space][hyphen][hyphen][space]} and changed it to "—" or (EM DASH}.

The writer meant to have a space before and after the punctuation mark, why was it changed the way it was? The proper change, in my view, would be to " – " or {[space]EN DASH][space]} as this makes the epub a better read.

Thank You

[DiapDealer]

Every style guide I know of (with the exception of the Associated Press style guide) states that there should be no spaces between an em dash and the adjacent words.

You can easily turn off dash smartening altogether in the plugin's config section if you want to handle your own non-standard manual conversion of the double-dashes. But I'm not changing the default behavior of the plugin's dash smartening to something non-standard.

[AlanHK]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Every style guide I know of (with the exception of the Associated Press style guide) states that there should be no spaces between an em dash and the adjacent words.

US style is em-dash, no spaces—like this.

UK style is a spaced en-dash – like this (except in number ranges: pages 80–81).

Some publishers do use spaced em dashes though, not that common.

I do dashes manually by S&R, as there is often a mix of hyphens and various dashes, spaced or unspaced. And then spend a while fixing ellipses, since I prefer spaced periods.

[Tex2002ans]

Originally Posted by thosp

The file in question had this, " -- " or {[space][hyphen][hyphen][space]} and changed it to "—" or (EM DASH}.

The writer meant to have a space before and after the punctuation mark, why was it changed the way it was? The proper change, in my view, would be to " – " or {[space]EN DASH][space]} as this makes the epub a better read.

If you change your "(EM/EN)-Dash Setting" to:

'--' = em dash (no en dash support)



I tested on this:

<p>This is a -- sample.</p>

and it changed to this:

<p>This is a — sample.</p>

Then you could search for (SPACE + EM DASH + SPACE):

Search: —

then replace with (SPACE + EN DASH + SPACE):

Replace: –

You could setup a Sigil Saved Search if you find you're doing this correction often. Then you could just run SmartenPunctuation, then the Saved Search right after.

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

You can easily turn off dash smartening altogether in the plugin's config section if you want to handle your own non-standard manual conversion of the double-dashes. But I'm not changing the default behavior of the plugin's dash smartening to something non-standard.

Agreed. I always keep the options for dashes + ellipses off, then correct that stuff on my own.

But maybe how you have that "(no en dash support)", you can have the opposite:

' -- ' = spaced en dash (no em dash support)

Note: Just tested in LibreOffice / Word, their AutoCorrect by default changes:

"--" -> en dash
" -- " -> spaced en dash
"sample-- " (two hyphens + space) -> unspaced em dash

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Every style guide I know of (with the exception of the Associated Press style guide) states that there should be no spaces between an em dash and the adjacent words.

On parenthetical expressions, also see:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dash#P...sentence_level

And I agree with AlanHK. From what I've read over the years:

The spaced EN DASH seems to be used more in British publications (and newspapers).

The EM DASH tends to be used more in American.

Spacing Side Note: On spacing around em dashes... there's "open-set" and "close-set":

Open-set = Both sides use hair or thin space (or, disgustingly, normal spaces)
Close-set = No space on either side

See Robert Bringhurst, "Elements of Typographic Style", Chapter 5:

5.2 DASHES, SLASHES & DOTS

5.2.1 Use spaced en dashes – rather than close-set em dashes or spaced hyphens – to set off phrases.

Standard computer keyboards and typewriters include only one dash: the hyphen. Any normal font of text type, either roman or italic, includes at least three. These are the hyphen and two sizes of long dash: the en dash – which is one en (half an em, M/2) in width – and the em dash-which is one em (two ens) wide. Many fonts also include a subtraction sign, which may or may not be the same length and weight as the en dash, and some include a figure dash (equal to the width of a standard numeral). The three-quarter em dash, and the three-to-em dash, which is one third of an em (M/3) in length, are often missing but perfectly easy to make.

In typescript, a double hyphen (--) is often used for a long dash. Double hyphens in a typeset document are a sure sign that the type was set by a typist, not a typographer. A typographer will use an em dash, three-quarter em, or en dash, depending on context or personal style. 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 word space either side.

[dynabook]

I haven't used PunctuationSmarten for awhile but used it successfully in the past. I tried to use it today several times and each time it logged me out of my user and went to the multi-user login screen.

I am running Sigil version 0.9.18 on MacOSX 10.14.6 (Mojave). The plugin version is 0.3.3 and I just removed and re-downloaded it fro MR and re-installed. Same results. I have been having crashes (memory issues?) with Sigil for a while but only when I close it after a heavy editing session not during use.

Any help or suggestion would be appreciated - even upgrading to v.1.2.0. I have not upgraded because 0.9.18 works for me and I am not sure waht advantage 1.2.0 would give me. Maybe I could install v.1.2.0 and try it.
--MH

[dynabook]

I have downloaded ver. 1.2.0 and tried the plugin with the same results.
--MH

[KevinH]

If you check out the release announcements, we explain all of the new features and bugs fixed included with each release.

[DiapDealer]

I have no idea how a python plugin could crash Sigil hard enough that it would end the current user session of the OS. Something else has to be in play, here. When does it happen? After selecting the parameters for the run, or as soon as you launch the plugin?

[KevinH]

Could you be using a shortcut key sequence assigned to fast user login switching?

Please disable fast user login in Apple preferences and then try again and let us know what happens? If Sigil 1.2.0 actually crashes it should generate a crash report. Please post is here or pm KevinH here with a link.

[dynabook]

The plugin crashes as soon as it starts to run. When I restart, the python launcher is in my recent dock items. Since I have done Sigil upgrades since using the plugin is there some parameters that got saved or could there be corruption in the exceptions file?

I will empty or delete the exceptions file and try again.
--MH

[KevinH]

What exactly do you mean by the plugin "crashing" and needing to "restart"? Getting the user login sounds like something else is going on. No plugin should not be able crash the Finder or the macOS kernel.. If it do see an actual crash, please enable the macOS Crash Report and post it. Do all other plugins work?

Does this plugin have a gui? Have you updated your Tk/Tcl version as recommended in the release notes for Sigil on macOS?