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Klаus
Klаus
Inspiring
January 5, 2018
Question

Optical margin alignment (OMA) ignores guillemets :-(

  • January 5, 2018
  • 2 replies
  • 2707 views

Hi there!

It seems to me that some glyphs are excluded from the optical margin alignment (OMA). I’ll try to attach a screen shot in order to demonstrate OMA’s good job with . and -, and sort of poor job with » and «.

How can I deal with that problem?

Thanks –

Klaus

    This topic has been closed for replies.

    2 replies

    Mike Witherell
    Community Expert
    Mike WitherellCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    January 6, 2018

    I did a test. When the guillemets are used in the Swiss/French style, pointing out, the Optical Margin seemed to move them, although only a little. When the guillemets are used in the German style, pointing in, the Optical Margin Alignment seemed not to move them AT ALL.

    Fascinating.

    Mike Witherell
      Klаus
      KlаusAuthor
      Inspiring
      January 6, 2018

      Yes, can be confirmed from my side. Although I’d say that shifting the outward pointing guy a bit further than his inward pointing brother is OK, in general.

      Another screen shot:

      Klаus
      KlаusAuthor
      Inspiring
      January 6, 2018

      What I want of course looks a little bit like this:

      Barb Binder
      Community Expert
      Barb BinderCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      January 5, 2018

      Hi Klaus,

      Such a good question and I wonder why it hasn't come up before. In playing around, I see that the various fonts I tried have two different guillemets: one is baseline aligned and the other is set higher. In my image below, the baseline-aligned ones are used second.

      Edit: both are hanging, but the case-sensitive ones extend further. So is it font-related?

      Here is the same text with Optical Margin Alignment turned off.

      ~Barb

      ~Barb at Rocky Mountain Training
        MW Design
        MW Design
        Inspiring
        January 5, 2018

        And those that are above the baseline are not even the ones normally keyed in. They are named guillemotleft.cap and guillemotright.cap and are used in case operations.

        It would be best if ID had the same capability as QXP always has had...being able to make sets of characters to apply OMA to. (One can literally add any character in a font if one is crazy enough to.)

        Barb Binder
        Community Expert
        Barb BinderCommunity Expert
        Community Expert
        January 5, 2018

        Thanks, Mike. I've been reading about them since my post. I don't need to use them in my work, and none of my students have asked me about them, so I'm trying to get up to speed.

        ~Barb

        ~Barb at Rocky Mountain Training
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