From: "Karl Pentzlin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Wednesday, May 28, 2003 9:59 PM
Subject: When do you use U+2024 ONE DOT LEADER instead of U+002E FULL STOP?


> When do you use U+2024 ONE DOT LEADER instead of U+002E FULL STOP?
> Is there a difference of appearance in high quality typesetting?
> - Karl

There seems to be a difference: leaders are expected to be written in sequences 
(sometimes long) to create a dotted line. The complete sequence of leaders then seems 
to be a form of tabulation (sort of whitespacing), and default ignorable, unlike the 
full stop which is a non ignorable punctuation (or a non ignorable decimal separator).

Also the sequence of 3 one-dot leaders is not completely an ellipsis punctuation, 
because many typesettings include a tiny space after the ellipsis (or after the full 
dot), this thin space being absent from the isolated leader.

The ellipsis is always a word or token separator, unlike the the full dot which maybe 
part of the same token (for example a decimal or floating or exponential number).

So one-dot leaders can safely be replaced by spaces without affecting the semantic, 
unlike the full stop or the ellipsis.


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