# Re: defining the script sizes via font dimens

• To: math-font-discuss@cogs.susx.ac.uk
• Subject: Re: defining the script sizes via font dimens
• From: Ulrik Vieth <vieth@thphy.uni-duesseldorf.de>
• Date: Mon, 20 Oct 1997 12:19:18 +0200

> PS.: And what about the new font dimensions for math spacing (ie \thinmuskip
> and friends) ? Has anybody experiences with customizing those values ? Should
> we expect them to vary between font families ?

I don't know if these are really necessary.  At present we have 1mu =
1/18 em, and the width of 1em is already in stored in the fontdimens.
Thus, if \thinmuskip and \thickmuskip are defined in multiples of 1mu,
they automatically get resized with the font size.  I really don't see
the need to supply their values explicitely.

As an aside: There are 256 muskip registers which are largely unused,
since the internal ones used in TeX's math spacing algorithm are
independent of those 256.  I guess it might be more interesting to
experiment with extra muskip parameters for manual fine tuning before
bothering too much about redefining the basic ones.

Take for example upright letters like \mathrm{i}' from a text font
with tight spacing.  If you want to insert some manual spacing in
expressions like 2\mathrm{i}', inserting a \thinmuskip (3mu) might be
too much, but something smaller like 1mu might be fine.  Just an idea.

Cheers, Ulrik.

P.S. I trimmed the To- and CC-address to the mailing list only.
There is no need to send extra copies to original correspondents
and it would be nice if you could do the same.