LibreOffice is more of a business program than a typesetting program in my experience.
Interesting that InDesign adds extra space if you type more than one. I prepared a document recently using ConTeXt, and it definitely ignores them. I explicitly set it up to use what we are calling “single spacing” (lest anyone here think I am advocating the use of extra space in all circumstances), which interestingly enough is not the default, and it handled everything pretty automatically including justification, tracking, leading, hairspaces, and other tweaks without having to screw around too much.
But I’m not going to write using a typewriter just so I can justify (heh) my usage of better looking text. So of course I’ll use the more readable and more attractive option when typing on a computer, too. It’s just a shame I can’t have double spaces on the Dope.
Yes, my point is that the vast, vast majority of what people type will never see a typesetter so the whole “But the typesetter…” or “but InDesign…” thing is moot. Unless you are writing specifically for something to be laid out and published, it doesn’t matter. A 0.05% fringe case shouldn’t have any impact on everyone else.
The agency I work for calls for double spacing for all written documents–memos, letters, public notices–all the way up to 1,000-page-long environmental impact statements. Font is Times New Roman, either 11/12/13 point depending on the document. We type in MS Word; some docs stay that way; most are converted to pdf. I’m not sure where the “automatically convert” talk comes in, because the spacing is pretty obvious in all our documents: the spacing after the end of a sentence is greater than between words, after abbreviations, etc. I like it that way. It looks better to my eyes. I think I’d have to quit if they mandated no double space. My fingers automatically type it.
Agree that most people never have to deal with book layout or typesetting, and my take on all this is that we shouldn’t try to force them. Hence why I think Word is broken in this regard: the output should be the same no matter how many spaces the business person types, and the default settings should automatically come out OK, even if unrefined.
Aren’t we trying to deconstruct this myth? If anything, I see evidence that, to the extent we are given explicit “rules”, they have been changing. this page has many good images of different typefaces, proportional as well as fixed, and even handwriting, with wide spacing. He or she also proposes some theories about the evolving rules, like that you couldn’t press the space bar twice on a Linotype machine.
To really get to the bottom of this issue, though, we need to ask what is the intended optical effect and how to achieve it. (If there is a generic answer, even Word and web browsers ought to be able to implement it.)
But the vast majority of what people read will see a ‘typesetter’. There is a reason that newspapers, magazines, and most books use the single space – it’s more readable.
I already knew about kerning. And I know there is a name for something which I’ve noticed before. It’s rare to see rivers in text, but sometimes they standout.
The only reason I even use a monospaced font is to represent a text from a seven-segment display. Which itself is becoming a dinosaur. There are so many good fonts to choose from, why use monospaced unless it’s really necessary?
Stopped using two spaces after a period when I started using HTML. They are not needed and do interrupt the flow.
Semicolons can die. Few people know how to use them properly.
