# Is hyphenation a lost writing skill? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 5, 2011, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hyphenation-a-lost-writing-skill/566430 "2011-01-05T00:32:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![MobiusStripes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d6d6ee/32.png) [@MobiusStripes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MobiusStripes)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hyphenation-a-lost-writing-skill/566430/21 "2011-01-05T16:36:39Z")
> [@Twoflower](#): > > I think readability is much better if there are no hyphens at all. I use a proportional font and justified alignment. My word processor is under strict instructions _not_ to auto-hyphenate. Only in very rare cases, where a long word makes the spacing all screwy, will I manually insert a hyphen. I’m with Twoflowers. With rare exceptions, I prefer left justified, ragged right, no hyphens. Full justification drives me batty. ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2011, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hyphenation-a-lost-writing-skill/566430/22 "2011-01-05T17:04:00Z")
> [@Twoflower](#): > > I think readability is much better if there are no hyphens at all. I use a proportional font and justified alignment. My word processor is under strict instructions _not_ to auto-hyphenate. Only in very rare cases, where a long word makes the spacing all screwy, will I manually insert a hyphen. This is the way it is for almost everything I read these days. I think it’s generally good practice to avoid using a hyphen simply to break a line at some arbitrary point. > [@Patty\_O\_Furniture](#): > > Hyphenation that is required in compound modifiers is definitely becoming a lost… whatever the OP said. It’s weird. Hyphens are disappearing from compound modifiers (I see a lot of things like “the land based bomber” instead of the correct “land-based bomber”)…BUT I also see a lot of cases, by the same writers, where they have started incorrectly _adding_ a hyphen to noun phrases that _would_ have a hyphen if they had been used as modifiers (example: the correct modifier “safety-significant changes have been made” leads the writer to add the incorrect “and so this improves the system’s safety-significance” later in the same document). ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2011, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hyphenation-a-lost-writing-skill/566430/23 "2011-01-06T21:05:31Z")
> [@Arnold\_Winkelried](#): > > I’ve never checked that, but can you give an example? Hyphenation seems like one thing that could easily be automated. I was probably too empathetic before. What I really meant was that Word 2007’s hyphenator is far inferior to the one WordPerfect had 20 years back. WP would let you specifiy that certain words never be hyphated, for instance, or that they alway be hyphenated in a particular place or not at all, or that you had to allow at least 4 characters on one side or the other, and so forth. But Word won’t do that. Likewise it won’t let yhou choose to, for instance, have allow [widows but not orphans](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Widow_%28typesetting%29), or the reverse. I’d complain more about my hatred of Word but I don’t wish to hjijack. ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2011, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hyphenation-a-lost-writing-skill/566430/24 "2011-01-07T01:25:01Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > The very short version is that the programs look at a few major variables, which are easier to adjust in a specialized program. How far back do you allow your hyphenation point to be, 0.25 inches? More? Less? Each creates breaks in different places. Do you allow hyphens at the end of every line? No more than three consecutive lines? Two? Some people consider this makes for a major difference in readability. What typefaces minimize the look of the extra spacing between words that a justifier must add? How are different typefonts handled by the different programs in the first place? Not identically, despite what you might think. Forget Word, which isn’t a decent layout program. But good layout programs like Pagemaker, Quark or InDesign allow the user to control all these variables, and a good layout artist knows how to adjust them for the particular job. > [@Skald The Rhymer](#): > > But Word won’t do that. Likewise it won’t let yhou choose to, for instance, have allow widows but not orphans, or the reverse. I’d complain more about my hatred of Word… You don’t have to. Word isn’t up to the task for professional text layout. As I mentioned above, serious layout programs allow independent control of widow and orphan situations as well as even more esoteric factors. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2011, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hyphenation-a-lost-writing-skill/566430/25 "2011-01-08T17:32:46Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > You don’t have to. Word isn’t up to the task for professional text layout. As I mentioned above, serious layout programs allow independent control of widow and orphan situations as well as even more esoteric factors. I’d buy that if WordPerfect hadn’t been able to control widows & orphans in 1990. I will, however, agree that Word is not up to the task of professional text layout. ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2011, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hyphenation-a-lost-writing-skill/566430/26 "2011-01-09T01:44:12Z")
TeX has a wonderful (and public domain) hyphenation algorithm (and one for each of dozens of languages). But its paragraph-setting mechanism is so good that it rarely hyphenates. And there are some pairs of words that are spelled the same and hyphenated differently (re-cord/rec-ord and equiv-alent/equi-valent are two that come to mind) and it won’t hyphenate them at all unless you put them in your exception dictionary. And you can add discretionary hyphens (used only when necessary). Very flexible and very accurate. It can even handle situations like they have in German where the word backen is hyphenated as bak-ken. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hyphenation-a-lost-writing-skill/566430.md?page=1)