Re: Adjusting column width dynamically to get rid of orphans and widows

[Hans Hagen <pragma@wxs.nl>]

On 6/20/2017 11:53 AM, Thomas Widmann wrote:
> On 20 June 2017 at 10:41, Henri Menke <henrimenke@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> On Tue, 2017-06-20 at 09:22 +0100, Thomas Widmann wrote:
>>>
>>> I recently started experimenting with using ConTeXt (mkiv) for dictionary typesetting. It's a much
>>> more attractive option than plain TeX or LaTeX because of the support for typesetting on a grid.
>>>
>>> However, grid typesetting can easily result in a large number of orphans and widows, which really
>>> doesn't look good in a dictionary.
>>>
>>> In an ideal world, I'd want to alter the column width slightly to prevent them (because most
>>> dictionaries aren't justified, this wouldn't be very noticeable).
>>>
>>> Would it be possible to use LuaTeX to achieve this?  I.e., could one write some code that gets
>>> triggered by orphans and widows and then alters the current column width slightly until the
>>> problem disappears?  Has somebody already done this?  Or have the relevant TeX internals not been
>>> Luafied yet?
>>>
>>> I'd also be interested in other ways to solve this issue – for instance changing the looseness
>>> dynamically instead of the column width.
>>
>> Have a look at \widowpenalty and \clubpenalty.  Also use margin kerning and font expansion.
> 
> \widowpenalty and \clubpenalty are almost useless in this context –
> believe me, I've tried! (I'm typesetting on a grid, with a fixed
> number of lines per page.) Which is why I'm looking for alternatives.
> 
> Margin kerning and font expansion are definitely options, but again,
> my real query would be how to trigger them dynamically to avoid a
> widow or an orphan.
can you make a small example showing the problem

Hans


-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
        tel: 038 477 53 69 | www.pragma-ade.nl | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------
___________________________________________________________________________________
If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the Wiki!

maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
webpage  : http://www.pragma-ade.nl / http://context.aanhet.net
archive  : https://bitbucket.org/phg/context-mirror/commits/
wiki     : http://contextgarden.net
___________________________________________________________________________________