Short Nerd Chief

Oh, how I do love obsessive people (although I wish we’d stop referring to them as “Nazis”).  The spelling obsessive is quite common, as is the grammar obsessive. I’d never observed the typographically OCD before now.  Via Lifehacker, observe Chris Phin, self described typography nazi:

A hyphen – the kind of short dash you see above – should really only be used when linking words such as ready-made. It shouldn’t even be used mathematically to represent a minus, as there’s a dedicated character for that, too [thanks, Dash Nazi!]. Most other uses mandate an en dash – as here, for example – or when planning meetings from 1–2. Changing fashions mean the the long dash—this one, called an em dash—is rarely seen, but where it is, it’s usual to render it without the spaces on either side or with special hairline spaces instead.

Chris gives solutions to most of the problems he identifies, at least for the Mac.  On Windows, there are two general ways to enter a special character. For some character sets, hold down [Alt] while pressing a series of numbers on the numeric keypad (not the row of numbers on the keyboard, so laptop users may well be challenged). In programs such as Microsoft Word, you can also enter the Unicode value and then press [Alt]+X.  Here are the PC solutions to Chris’ typographical mistakes:

Characters can also be inserted in any Windows program by using the Character Map, which (on XP) is found under System Tools on the Start Menu.  This was the only way to insert the Alt-X unicode characters in Windows Live Writer, which does not accept the Alt-X command.

I, of course, do none of these things, but this was an interesting exercise nonetheless.