zlacker

> I can’t stand using a hyphen to mean negative or subtract

I wonder what the difference is. Maybe in unicode one is slightly longer than the other, but at the end of the day, aren't they both just a horizontal line?

>>fogof+(OP)
In proportional fonts, the minus sign is significantly longer and usually slightly higher and thinner than the hyphen (so it lines up with the horizontal bar of the + sign). If you’re used to it, it looks much better than a hyphen. (Similar to using real quotation marks instead of the straight ones etc.)

>>fogof+(OP)
Compare the following two examples:

5 − 2 = 3

5 - 2 = 3

The first one is correct. It contains the Unicode character 'MINUS SIGN' (U+2212). The second contains the Unicode character 'HYPHEN-MINUS' (U+002D) which is not suitable for representing the minus sign in mathematical typesetting.

Also, see https://i.imgur.com/ngFI3JB.png for a few examples typeset with MathJax. The first example has a proper minus sign (correct) whereas the second one contains a hyphen (incorrect). By the way, in plain HTML, the character entity reference "−" displays the minus sign, although I just use MathJax when proper mathematics typesetting is required in HTML pages.

>>fogof+(OP)
> I wonder what the difference is.

A properly rendered minus is identical to the horizontal stroke of a plus (whereas hyphen is frequently shorter and/or incorrectly vertically aligned).