[Dspace-general] Subscripts in Abstracts

Tue Jun 5 16:06:55 EDT 2007

Martin, Sunny,

Yes! Sorry, my memory was clouded by a time gap since I did that. You are right, there is more to it than cutting and pasting and forcing the process backward, etc.

For fairly predictable results (and assuming you are not doing very recently encoded characters, etc.) you need to input numeric character references directly (the Unicode code point for the subscript or other character, preceded by ampersand, number character, and the letter x). Then forcing the submission process *two/three steps back and one step forward* as we mentioned before will make DSpace process the character property information and output the right character to the screen the next time you see the metadata and abstract.

Since people sometimes talk about things differently there could be other terms for this type of direct input more familiar to you. To clarify the form of what I mean by numeric character references (direct input), here are a couple of examples:
&#x2074 [superscript 4]
&#x00B9 [superscript 1]
&#x207A [superscript plus]

For your workflow, you can create a text or Word file containing the names of all the special characters likely to be needed, associated with their equivalent strings in direct input form (as illustrated above). If you do it in Word, you could show the glyph (what you want to see), followed by the direct input form, followed by its common name in brackets.

Grace Wiersma
Cataloging & Metadata Services
MIT Libraries
gwiersma at mit.edu
(617) 253-0643

-----Original Message-----
From: dspace-general-bounces at MIT.EDU [mailto:dspace-general-bounces at MIT.EDU] On Behalf Of Martin Courtois
Sent: Tuesday, June 05, 2007 3:17 PM
To: Sunyeen Pai
Cc: dspace-general at mit.edu
Subject: Re: [Dspace-general] Subscripts in Abstracts

I've had some success with this approach:

1. Open the abstract in Word.
2. On the Insert menu, select Symbol.
3. Set the font to Arial Unicode MS.  This list has many, but not all
subscripts, superscripts, math symbols, etc.  I'm not sure if it has
italic characters.
4. Select the symbol, then click Insert.
5. Copy/paste the text from Word into DSpace and submit the item.

It's important to insert the character(s) as a symbol.  If I use
Format/Font in Word to display subscripts for example, it won't carry
over into DSpace.

I'm sure I'm missing the root of the issue, but this seems to work in
some instances.

Marty

Martin Courtois
Information Technology Assistance Center
509 Hale Library
Kansas State University
Manhattan KS 66506
Phone: 785 532-4428
Fax: 785 532-3199
E-mail: courtois at ksu.edu

Quoting Sunyeen Pai <sunyeen at hawaii.edu>:

> Hi there,
>
> We have a similar request regarding the use of italics in keyword and
> abstract fields.  My first reaction was that this was not possible,
> until I saw these emails.
>
> I tried the solution suggested by adding a superscript character
> using the submission steps at the top and the next button at the
> bottom of the screen, but no success.  Did I leave something out or
> is there another solution?  Perhaps a kind of escape character that
> will trigger the system to interpret the enclosed characters
> differently?
>
> Thank you very much,
> Sunny
> University of Hawaii at Manoa Library
>
> >
> > Message: 2
> > Date: Mon, 4 Jun 2007 13:32:07 -0400
> > From: "Grace Wiersma" <gwiersma at MIT.EDU>
> > Subject: Re: [Dspace-general] Subscripts in Abstracts
> > To: "'Martin Courtois'" <courtois at ksu.edu>,
> <dspace-general at MIT.EDU>
> > Message-ID:
> <004501c7a6ce$4692ad40$77013312 at mitlibraries.ms.mit.edu>
> > Content-Type: text/plain;	charset="UTF-8"
> >
> > Martin,
> >
> > The copy and paste method will work for you if you tweak it. This
> > means that after the copy and paste action, you must *reverse* the
> > metadata submission process, so to speak, by pressing the prior
> > step buttons at the top of the screen to force it to move
> > *backward* to an earlier stage. Then, reverse directions again by
> > pressing the *next* step buttons, clicking through the process to
> > where you had stopped, and then moving on to the next step in
> > submission. This apparently has the effect of forcing the
> > character property data (super- and subscript information) that
> > accompanies what you already pasted into the form before to be
> > *swallowed* by the server so that it regurgitates the proper
> > characters to the screen from then onward. If you do not see the
> > characters display as they should by the time you get to the
> > subsequent step in submission, it has not worked and you need to
> > try again. Sometimes it takes a couple of tries, as I recall. For
> > wild and wooly characters, this worka!
> > round is not effective, but super- and subscript characters are
> > now apparently part of the core encoding that is accepted by the
> > system.
> > Sorry, I am not looking at the submission screen at the moment, so
> > cannot be more precise about the exact names of buttons, etc.
> >
> > Hope this helps.
> >
> > Grace Wiersma
> > Cataloging & Metadata Services
> > MIT Libraries
> > gwiersma at mit.edu
> > (617) 253-0643
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: dspace-general-bounces at MIT.EDU [mailto:dspace-general-
> > bounces at MIT.EDU] On Behalf Of Martin Courtois
> > Sent: Monday, June 04, 2007 1:10 PM
> > To: dspace-general at mit.edu
> > Subject: [Dspace-general] Subscripts in Abstracts
> >
> > Is there a way to render subscripts or superscripts correctly in
> > abstracts?
> >
> > We use DSpace for electronic theses and dissertations, and many
> > submissions have special characters or symbols in the abstract.
> For
> > some symbols, the student can use Word to insert the symbol, then
> copy
> > it into the DSpace submission form.  But, this process doesn't work
> > with sub- or superscripts.
> >
> > Thanks for any suggestions or ideas,
> >
> > Marty
> >
> > Martin Courtois
> > Information Technology Assistance Center
> > 509 Hale Library
> > Kansas State University
> > Manhattan KS 66506
> > Phone: 785 532-4428
> > Fax: 785 532-3199
> > E-mail: courtois at ksu.edu
> > _______________________________________________
> > Dspace-general mailing list
> > Dspace-general at mit.edu
> > http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/dspace-general
>
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