Em dashes and emojis
this post was submitted on 07 Jul 2025
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How the hell do you even type an em dash?
I'm sure it's possible (I know it's easy on a touch keyboard), but if the person who sent it has never used em dashes in their life, then it's pretty definitive proof. Otherwise, it's just a big clue that you might combine with other factors.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compose_key
If I had a nickel for each time this week, I needed to link to this, I'd have two nickels; which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice.
Okay, I must confess, I knew about that, as well as the other options in the replies. I never used any of them but I knew they exist. When I asked it was sort of as a rhetorical question. People generally wouldn't know about these obscure typing options, so I was playing the everyman.
Even if you do know it, if you don't use it often enough you forget and have to look it up again next time.
On a mobile phone it's super easy. Long press the hyphen button and swipe over to the dash.
On Mac it's pretty easy still, but requires a little more knowledge. Option-shift-dash. (Without the shift gives you an en dash.)
On Windows it's the completely arcane alt-0151, and only possible if you have a numpad. I memorised it like 15 years ago and have regularly used it since, but it's hard to blame people for not doing so.
No idea about Linux.
—–-¯_
You could make it easier on windows with an on-screen keyboard probably
This is what I've been using for years -> https://github.com/samhocevar/wincompose
Well it depends on the keyboard layout, on Linux, at least—but on other platforms too, I think.
Word and Google docs will translate them from --
They'll also give you the stupid smart quotes.
I've never break up with anybody over text but if for some reason I had to I would certainly write it on a computer first.
edit: LOL apparently lemmy markdown also translates them from
--that's odd, Voyager showed me -- double hyphen
Fair point. It's still a red flag (in more ways than one!) but I accept it's not definitive.
You use use the compose key with a sequence of characters. Mine is right alt, so it's gonna be:
right alt, then -, then -, then -
—
Considering that a comma has its own button, it's no wonder which one is preferred.
We could ask an LLM, but it’s probably bot a good idea given the post 😄