how to write one or more points overlapping the function to be derived, instead of one or more apexes
???
Can you give an example or describe in more detail what you are talking about and what any prefix operator would have to do with it?
You are not talking about showing points on the graph of a function instead using just vertical markers, aren't you?
Or are you talking about Newton's dots-notation of a derivative?
Here you would have to use Windows's character map, group after Unicode and chose the section with diacritic characters.
Use U+0307 and U+0308 for one and two dots. Not sure how to create higher derivatives (e.g. three dots in triangle shape on top of a variable name).
In languages where umlauts (ä,ö,ü) are used (German, Turkish, ...), the use of ü can be misleading. Equally if not more problematic is the Newton notation for the first derivative of a current function i(t).
The ISO-80000-2 does not address this issue and explicitly specifies the point notation only for the first and second derivative as permissible notation if the independent variable is time. I find this restriction to the meaning of the variable as time clearly too restrictive, because this notation is generally quite common for derivatives with parameter representation.
Maybe you have this thread Re: Dot over variable - PTC Community in mind or the thread(s) Luc is referring to?
@-MFra- wrote:
The dots are barely visible in font size 12. Enlarging it then messes up the whole page. Isn't there a cooler way?
Yes, there was also a reason why I chose the Arial font and a lowercase letter without ascenders. 😉
It looks ugly using TimesNewRoman and a capital letter.
You may use a different style for your special variables, but I guess it does not get much better: Here Y is in style 'User 1' set to Courier New, 12 pt, while the rest is at it defaults (Times New Roman, 10 pt).
You can try to use different fonts and see if it looks better but many fonts don't support diacritic characters and will show the dots to the right of the letter and not above it or show them not at all.
Can't think of an easy way to achieve the desired effect and I can't remember to have seen a better solution here in the forum in the past (which doesn't mean a lot as I tend to forget things quite often)..
Of course you always can use a free font editor and modify an existing font according to your wishes. You may enlarge the dots or even add letters which already have the dots on them at the size and position you like.
That's a bit of a work to do and if you share a worksheet using non-standard fonts you would have to share the modified font as well (unless you don't t share the Mathcad sheet itself but just a pdf with embedded font).
BTW, are we talking about variable names in math regions or just text in text regions?
@StuartBruff wrote:
You’ve got Math, string and text examples. Bargain! 😃
Stuart
🙂
Unfortunately the display in good old Mathcad is rather unusable. Prime does a much better job here.
See yourself - six times a "Y" with two dots above it
Prime 10:
Mathcad 15:
Here MC15 with variables in 38 pt instead of the standard 10 pt
Here is the same Times New Roman in Prime 10:
Following on from Werner's comments, here's something (modified) from a Unicode worksheet that I wrote a few years ago. It's in Mathcad Prime 10, but I think it should port to Mathcad 15.
For those not familiar with diacritical characters, they effectively give an application's screen drawing code instructions to "backspace" over the preceding character and overstrike that character with the diacritical character. Consequently, to delete the overstruck character entirely both the character and the diacritic must be deleted.
In some rendition systems, diacritics can be combined; in the triple dot case shown above, this means deleting three characters to delete the overstruck character. Diacritics can also be confusing when moving the cursor across a character - usually, two movements are required.
NB: In Prime, To make use of a single- or double-dotted character, copy the string output, paste it into a Math Region, and delete the quotes. To copy any of the overstruck characters to a TextBox, copy it into the Find Box, deleted the quotes, and then copy/paste the overstruck character into the Text Box.
Stuart
The original Unicode worksheet was written in response to an Alfasoft article on this topic. As usual, what started as a simple couple of lines of Mathcad code ended up as a multipage horror of intertwined functions as ideas and abstractions occurred to me. Unfortunately, this means the Unicode worksheet is quite complex and challenging to disentangle to give a short solution to the overstrike problem. Otherwise, I'd have posted the worksheet.
Having seen @Werner_E's comment about Arial font, I thought, "Why not? It's 0500 hrs, and I can't get back to sleep". So, ...
It's a shame about all of the ones that worked italicising the triple-dot, and I hate to gainsay Werner, but I find Arial's triple-dot a little bit too close to the 'a'.
I tried several other fonts, but Cambria and Times New Roman were the only roman fonts I tested that showed a triangular triple-dot. A few others got close, but not enough to win the stuffed bear. I had hopes for TeX Gyre ScholaX until I tried the capital 'A'. STIX Two Math looks good - if you ignore the chimney stack effect capital A and the vertical space the font covers.
Mathcad Prime 10 worksheet attached.
Stuart
Using the capital Y as posted by @-MFra- I guess the font does not matter as it looks undesirable. I just tested Times New Roman and Arial - here with the diaeresis (two dots) in MC15
Some fonts contain already some characters including the dots. But still not that big dots as @-MFra- had shown.
I used your "char" in MC15 and all strings are in Times New Roman. Nonetheless some are shown without serifs even though they look 'right" in the character map app. Not sure, why
This is how it looks in the Character Map
Copied to Mathcad (Variables and Constants, both styles use Times New Roman)
Conclusion: There seems to be no really satisfying solution except to create the characters yourself with a font editor (or by chance to find a font somewhere where someone else has created the desired characters satisfactorily).
Well, it looks to me as if you and @-MFra- are going to be busy designing new fonts in the near future. 😈
I'm full of admiration for people who have the mental stamina to pay such consistent attention to detail. If I can't calculate it, I tend to lose interest very rapidly and my mind goes walkabout on a squirrel hunt.
Here are the functions I use.
Plus the updated 'dot' functions and alphabet strings.
Stuart
Revised version of worksheet uploaded. This new version includes some of my, slightly modified, set of string functions.
Forgot to add ...
The extra string functions are only there to help generate the character table at the end of the worksheet, which was directly copied from my original 'Unicode' worksheet. Not all of the string functions are necessary and most are overkill for what they do. However, they had other uses within the original parent worksheet. It wasn't worth the hassle of cutting the useful functions from the herd and taming them.
Stuart
