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Radical Pie |
Every character in an equation has both a role and a style. The role determines how the character behaves, and the style determines how the character appears. When typing in MATH mode or CHEM mode, the role and style are initially chosen for each character based on the character’s meaning. When typing in TEXT mode, the assigned role is always General Text, and the assigned style is Upright. Roles and styles can be changed later using the Role and Style menus to make a character behave as though it had a specific meaning different from its default.
The current mode is selected by choosing a mode from the Equation menu, by using the corresponding keyboard shortcuts, or by clicking in the mode box in the bottom-left corner of the editor window.
In MATH mode, letters are assumed to have the role of Mathematical Name, and they are assigned the Italic style. The numerical digits 0–9 are given the role of Number and assigned the Upright style.
Other types of characters are given a role such as Operator, Relation, or Punctuation and assigned the Upright style.
When Radical Pie detects that you have entered a standard function name such as “sin” or “log”, it automatically changes the role for the entire name to Standard Function and makes the style Upright. This role causes a little extra space to be added before and after the function name. See Standard Functions for more information.
The rules by which roles and styles are selected in CHEM mode are very similar to those used in MATH mode, but Roman letters are handled differently. In CHEM mode, letters are given the role of Chemical Element, and they are assigned the Upright style. If a chemical element name is preceded by a character having the role of Number, then a little extra space is added between the number and the element name.
Radical Pie provides a mechanism by which the style of the next character typed can be specified in advance, and this works in both MATH mode and CHEM mode. Any of the styles under the Style menu that have a keyboard shortcut can be typed ahead of time, and then the next character entered will acquire the corresponding style. For example, to type a double-struck R to represent the set of real numbers, you can type Ctrl+D followed immediately by the capital letter R, and the result will be the character ℝ. When a style has been specified in this manner for the next character, a sample letter is displayed in the status bar using the same style to indicate that the override mechanism is active. You can cancel this style by pressing the Escape key. Otherwise, the style resets to the default after one character has been entered.
The Greek and Greek Bold styles are special. In particular, the style assigned to a Greek letter depends on whether it’s a small letter or a capital letter. If you type Ctrl+G followed by a small Roman letter, then that letter is converted to Greek and assigned the Italic style. However, if you type Ctrl+G followed by a capital Roman letter, then the Greek equivalent is assigned the Upright style, consistent with mathematical typsetting conventions. If you really want an upright small Greek letter or an italic capital Greek letter, then you can get them by selecting the letter and typing Ctrl+G again to toggle between the two styles.