Question on Typing Characters

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Guest

New user to Microsoft Word, and to this group. A friend directed me here.
How do I type elongated dashes, longer than the hypen produced by the hypen
key on the keyboard.
Thanks
Liz
 
New user to Microsoft Word, and to this group. A friend directed me here.
How do I type elongated dashes, longer than the hypen produced by the hypen
key on the keyboard.
Thanks
Liz
Click to expand...

There are two longer dashes, an "en dash" and an "em dash", originally
roughly the widths of the letters n and m. In Word, the built-in
keyboard shortcuts for them are Ctrl+num- for the en dash and
Ctrl+Alt+num- for the em dash (that is, hold down the Ctrl key or the
Ctrl and Alt keys, and then press the minus key on the number pad,
assuming the NumLock is turned on).

The AutoFormat function (Tools > AutoCorrect Options > AutoFormat As
You Type > Hyphens with dashes) will convert spaces and dashes
automatically, but the rules are confusing. According to the Help
topic "Automatically format hyphens as en dashes and em dashes":

"When you type a space and one or two hyphens between text, Microsoft
Word automatically inserts an en dash ( – ). If you type two hyphens
and do not include a space before the hyphens, then an em dash (— ) is
created."

For more info, see
http://www.word.mvps.org/FAQs/General/InsertSpecChars.htm.

--
Regards,
Jay Freedman
Microsoft Word MVP
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Thank you so much. That is what I required.
It seems my friend sent me to the correct place.
 
If you produce dashes this way, it's because you have defined those keyboard
shortcuts. By default, Ctrl+N opens a new blank document and Ctrl+M indents
the paragraph.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

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all may benefit.
 
Thank you all for the help.


Suzanne S. Barnhill said:
If you produce dashes this way, it's because you have defined those keyboard
shortcuts. By default, Ctrl+N opens a new blank document and Ctrl+M indents
the paragraph.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.
Click to expand...
 
Hello, A publication I am preparing a document for is calling for a 3-em
dash, which I cannot seem to make happen. I set the autoformat as you type to
the appropriate "replace hyphen with dash", but what I'm looking for is a
LONGER dash, like the equivalent of 3 hyphens, which I cannot make work, for
some reason. The publication wants me to use it in a bibliography, for the
2nd and subsequent appearance of a particular author;s name. Can you help? It
should be about the same length as an underline of 5 spaces, but they specify
NOT to use underlines.
Thanks,
Ellen
 
Enter three em dashes in succession. You can't use AutoFormat to do this;
you'll have to actually insert them using Insert | Symbol unless you have
assigned a shortcut key (or use the built-in one).

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.
 
Thanks for your answer, but I have a few questions about it, please:
(1) In Insert/Symbol, the 'em' isn't there, so how do I get it there, and
make the hyphens that will be in the Insert/Symbol to transform into the long
dash? (2) you refer to the built-in shortcut key--which one would that be, in
this case? Thank you again.

Ellen
 
After you click on the Insert pull-down menu and select Symbol, you will
have to click the tab at the top of the open dialog box that says "special
characters" and you will find the en dash and the em dash listed.

The built in shortcut key combination for the en dash is the Control Key and
the hyphen

The built in shortcut key combination for the em dash is the Control Key and
the Alt key and the minus sign on the numeric keypad.
 
You can find the em dash at U2014 (in the General Punctuation character
subset) or on the Special Characters tab of Insert | Symbol, which should
also show the keyboard shortcut. I've got Ctrl+M assigned to it on my
machine, but the built-in shortcut is Alt+Ctrl+Num- (that is, the minus key
on the numeric keypad). (Do NOT use Alt+Ctrl+Hyphen; see
http://sbarnhill.mvps.org/WordFAQs/LostSymbol.htm.) For more on inserting
special characters, see
http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/General/InsertSpecChars.htm

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.
 
You cannot use the hyphen in combination with the Alt+Ctrl in order to
produce the em dash.

But the shortcut for the en dash is the Ctrl+Hyphen key combination.
 
I did not suggest that you could use Alt+Ctrl+Hyphen to do this; I
specifically warned the OP not to do this. Many users DO do this by mistake,
not realizing that the shortcut requires the minus key on the numeric
keypad. The result is that they end up deleting menu entries, as described
in http://sbarnhill.mvps.org/WordFAQs/LostSymbol.htm

Moreover, Ctrl+Hyphen does NOT insert an en dash. It inserts an optional
hyphen (which will be printed only if the word breaks at the end of a line).
Although it looks a lot like an en dash when nonprinting characters are
displayed (see http://word.mvps.org/FAQs/Formatting/NonPrintChars.htm), it
will actually be quite invisible when they are not. To insert an en dash,
use Ctrl+Num- (that is Ctrl and the minus key on the numeric keypad) or one
of the other insertion methods.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA

Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.
 
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