Modification of overrightarrow

Question

I have a simple question... I want a modified version of \overrightarrow such that:

So, the (n) is vertically aligned with the arrow. And this of course for every letter and symbol. The first line I make with

\documentclass{standalone}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\begin{document}
\pagestyle{empty}
$\displaystyle \overrightarrow{a}^{(n)} \text{ and } \overrightarrow{A}^{(n)}$
\end{document}

The second line is made with paint (manually aligning the (n)'s)

In the second line, the (n) is vertically aligned with the arrow — seaver, Mar 18 '21 at 15:09
I actually already did this, but this does not yield a generic solution... (as far as I could find) — seaver, Mar 18 '21 at 15:13
I added some code in the post. I kindof assumed it was clear, haha :P — seaver, Mar 18 '21 at 15:37

score 7 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 18 '21 at 16:55

You can just brace \overright{a}. However, I suggest a slimmer form of the arrows, because the default ones are really too big.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage[old]{old-arrows}
\newcommand{\vect}[1]{{\varoverrightarrow{#1}}}
\begin{document}
$\vect{a}^{(n)}$ and $\vect{A}^{(n)}$
\end{document}

If you want the standard arrows, just remove the call to old-arrows and remove var from the definion of \vect to get

This is exactly what I meant, thank you! – seaver Mar 18 '21 at 19:15 — seaver, Mar 18 '21 at 19:15

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 18 '21 at 16:21

The idea comes from the answer of Steven B. Segletes here: How can I move the superscript higher?, which suggest to use \strut and, in a comment, \rule{0pt}{<dimen>}. As I think this second solution is more interesting, I thought it appropriate to summarize it here:

\documentclass[margin=2mm]{standalone}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\newcommand{\moveup}[1]{\rule{0pt}{#1pt}}
\begin{document}
 $\displaystyle \overrightarrow{a}\moveup{7.5}^{(n)} 
\text{ and } 
\overrightarrow{A}\moveup{10}^{(n)}$
\end{document}

Thanks for the suggestion, as I use this on different types of symbols, the solution is not as generic as I would like, but the trick is a very nice one for my toolbox. Thank you! — seaver, Mar 18 '21 at 19:14

Modification of overrightarrow

2 Answers2