Thin Space, Hair Space, Right-Aligned Tab

[garrettm30]

Here are a couple suggestions concerning three whitespaces that I use frequently.

First, Thin Space (non-breaking), Hair Space, and Right-Aligned Tab are the three white spaces I am used to using that are not currently in the Text->Insert menu. Adding them to the insert menu also lets us assign keyboard shortcuts. (Indesign has a keyboard shortcut assigned for Thin Space and Right-Alligned Tab, but hair space is in the menu without a shortcut, so this would be a win for me.)

Secondly, thin space (U+2009) is not rendered very thin in Publisher, particular in justified text.

Thirdly, the thin space I need (in French typography, used between several common punctuation marks such as question marks) needs to be nonbreaking. Specifically, this is "NARROW NO-BREAK SPACE" U+202F in Unicode. Indesign complicates matters. It offers a "Thin Space" that it treats as nonbreaking, but it apparently uses "THIN SPACE" U+2009, which in my understanding is not explicitly nonbreaking. When text in Indesign is pasted into Publisher, U+2009 that was formerly nonbreaking is breakable in Affinity Publisher. MS Word also treats U+2009 as nonbreaking, so although I think Publisher may actually be performing according to Unicode spec, it is a sticky situation.

To summarize, the hair space and nonbreaking thin space (however you choose to work it out) are needed in my work. I can at least work around by inserting with the Mac Character Viewer. Right-aligned tab can be worked around with other methods, but it is a nice convenience to hit that shift-tab.

The first answer on this post on StackOverflow.com, although dealing with HTML as the context, is still very helpful explaining the problem with the nonbreaking thin space for typesetting in French in the digital age.

[fde101]

You might find this useful:  https://poynton.ca/notes/misc/mac-unicode-hex-input.html

[garrettm30]

That is an interesting procedure I didn't know about. Thank you for that. Generally I think that a key command would be much faster, or even having to go to an insert menu with the mouse would still be more helpful. I already switch between French and English keyboard layout multiple times a day (using key command of course), but having more than just two key layouts often works out to more frustration than it is worth, as it no longer is just a simple toggle back and forth.