Re: cal & calligraphic

[Hans van der Meer <hansm@science.uva.nl>]

For your information, the problem arose because Y&Y's MathTimes does  
not has its calligraphic letters in the MathItalic font, but in a  
separate calligraphic font (mtms and friends).

On Dec 4, 2005, at 11:53, Taco Hoekwater wrote:

> Hans van der Meer wrote:
>
>> I am confused about the behaviour of \cal and calligraphic.
>> In a font where the calligraphic letters are in MathItalic all  
>> goes  well.
>> But, in a font where the calligraphic letters come from another  
>> font  I get:
>>   \definefontsynonym [Calligraphic] [FONT_OTHER_THAN_MathSymbol]
>>
>
> The font "Calligraphic" is not the same as the math alphabet for \cal,
> except when the only calligraphic alphabet available is the one in
> the math font. The confusion arises because in text mode, \cal is
> remapped to the \calligraphic command. (switching to math mode would
> be too hard to do reliably at this point).
>

>
> B.: Or there could be:
>
>   in text: \calligraphic{ABC} is ok
>   in text: {\cal ABC} is ok
>   in math: $\calligraphic{ABC}$ is ok
>   in text: ${\cal ABC}$ is ok
>
> This needs an even weirder definition of \cal, but it can be
> done (note: this trashes a math family completely!):
>
>     \def\cal%
>        {\mathortext
>          {\hbox{%
>            \symbolicscaledfont{1}{Calligraphic}%
>            \global\textfont\nnfam=\thedefinedfont
>            \symbolicscaledfont{0.7}{Calligraphic}%
>            \global\scriptfont\nnfam=\thedefinedfont
>            \symbolicscaledfont{0.5}{Calligraphic}%
>            \global\scriptscriptfont\nnfam=\thedefinedfont}%
>           \fam\nnfam }
>         {\symbolicfont{Calligraphic}}}
>

I would think the most elegant solution is the one where \calligraphic 
{ABC} and {\cal ABC} in both text and math modes give the same  
result. Thus no exceptional behaviour for one of these four. Any  
other choice would in my opinion be confusing and difficult to  
understand.

yours sincerely,
Hans van der Meer