Preventing hyphenation of a word with \hyphenation does not always work

Question

I know that it is possible to prevent the hyphenation of a word by setting \hyphenation{ }. However, this does not seem to work in some cases. Here is an example, where the word is the acronym "IRES".

\documentclass[12pt,a4paper]{article}
\usepackage[italian]{babel}
\hyphenation{IRES}
\begin{document}
\begin{minipage}{7.6cm}
  Un Ente non residente può svolgere un'attività commerciale in Italia
  partecipando a una società di capitali italiana o attraverso una stabile
  organizzazione. In entrambi i casi sul reddito d'impresa si applicherà
  l'IRES. La stabile organizzazione dovrà determinare il reddito d'impresa
  prodotto nel territorio dello Stato applicando le stesse regole
  applicabili alle società di capitali italiane come se si trattasse di
  un'entità separata e indipendente dall'ente estero.
\end{minipage}
\end{document}

Which results in

with XeLaTeX

\documentclass[12pt,a4paper]{article}
\usepackage[italian]{babel}
\begin{document}
\begin{minipage}{7.6cm}
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa bbbbbbbbbb cccccccccc
aiii  sul reddito d'impresa  applicherà
  l'IRES. La stabile organizzazione
applicabili alle società di capitali italiane come se si trattasse di
  un'entità separata e indipendente dall'ente estero.
\end{minipage}
\end{document}

David Carlisle · Answer 1 · 2023-03-07T17:22:16.767

7

Italian makes ' take part in hyphenation so you need l'IRES

\documentclass[12pt,a4paper]{article}
\usepackage[italian]{babel}
{\lccode'='
\hyphenation{l'IRES}
}
\begin{document}
\begin{minipage}{7.6cm}
  Un Ente non residente può svolgere un'attività commerciale in Italia
  partecipando a una società di capitali italiana o attraverso una stabile
  organizzazione. In entrambi i casi sul reddito d'impresa si applicherà
  l'IRES. La stabile organizzazione dovrà determinare il reddito d'impresa
  prodotto nel territorio dello Stato applicando le stesse regole
  applicabili alle società di capitali italiane come se si trattasse di
  un'entità separata e indipendente dall'ente estero.
\end{minipage}
\end{document}

But hyphenation will be poor with OT1, you should always use T1 if using pdflatex.

Lualatex shows the same breakpoint as xelatex on the xelatex example, and the same solution as above removes the hyphenation resulting in

But for reasons not documented (but probably related to implementation details of interacting with harfbuzz) the code doesn't work (and nor does anything else I tried) using xelatex.

See egreg's answer, you can use ’ rather than ' in \hyphenation for xelatex.

edited Mar 07 '23 at 17:22

answered Mar 07 '23 at 12:09

David Carlisle

757,742

Unfortunately, it doesn't work in my actual book. I use OT1 in the MWE, but for the book I am using XeLaTeX. Could it be the reason? – Massimo Mar 07 '23 at 14:18
1

@Massimo oh hyphenation is "different" in Unicode TeXs, you should have said:-) Let me see.... – David Carlisle Mar 07 '23 at 14:22
@Massimo I updated your question and my answer – David Carlisle Mar 07 '23 at 14:53
Thank you! Too bad it doesn't work with XeLaTeX/LuaLaTeX – Massimo Mar 07 '23 at 15:36
1

@Massimo it does work with lualatex, just xetex seems out – David Carlisle Mar 07 '23 at 15:51
Does the "last resort" \mbox really not work? (The timing of comments/edits isn't totally clear.) – barbara beeton Mar 07 '23 at 16:58
@barbarabeeton oh mbox works yes, but unlike luatex or pdftex you can't use ', as a preamble declaration but see egreg's answer – David Carlisle Mar 07 '23 at 17:19
Thanks, I've put an addendum in my "frequently asked question" about \hyphenation citing this question. – barbara beeton Mar 07 '23 at 17:23
Better use \babelhyphenation which takes the \lccode into account. – Javier Bezos Mar 07 '23 at 17:46
@JavierBezos yes actually I mentioned babel hyphenation in a (deleted) comment on the question but when I came to the answer I dropped back on old habits:-) I should adjust. Would it be possible for that to also work for xetext (substituting '?) – David Carlisle Mar 07 '23 at 18:47

score 7 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 07 '23 at 16:12

For XeLaTeX you need to avoid hyphenation of “l’IRES” (with U+2019), because ' is replaced with ’ at typesetting time, but not when \hyphenation is used.

\documentclass[12pt,a4paper]{article}
\usepackage[italian]{babel}
{\lccode’=’
\hyphenation{l’IRES}
}
\begin{document}
\parbox{0pt}{\hspace{0pt}l'IRES}
\end{document}

Probably you also need all’IRES and dell’IRES.

If you have troubles with inputting ’, then

{\lccode"2019="2019
\hyphenation{l^^^^2019IRES}
}

will do as well.

ah of course. That's really unfortunate, I'll have to upvote you:( — David Carlisle, Mar 07 '23 at 17:20

Preventing hyphenation of a word with \hyphenation does not always work

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