General ⇒ Additional space within glossed examples

[jfontana]

Hi,

I'm preparing a presentation (using Beamer) where I need to include glossed examples. I'm using the Linguex macros (with package cgloss4e from gb4e). My problem is that in some cases the examples are very long and extend over more than two lines. This makes it very difficult for people to distinguish the example from its gloss. So what I get is something like the following:

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(1) example text example text example text text example text example text
    gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text
    example text example text example text text example text example text
    gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text
    example text example text example text text example text example text
    gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text

    "Translation text Translation text Translation text Translation text
     Translation text Translation text Translation text Translation text
     Translation text "

What I would like to be able to do is leave an extra line between each pair of example - gloss lines so that I get something like:

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(x) example text example text example text text example text example text
    gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text

    example text example text example text text example text example text
    gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text gloss text

    "Translation text Translation text Translation text Translation text
    Translation text Translation text Translation text Translation text"

The regular command to do this does not seem to work within an example. So, while adding \\~\\ works perfectly to leave an extra space between the example-gloss section and the translation, it doesn't do anything when it is added between the example and the gloss.

I imagine that this is a common problem since I have seen many publications where there is additional space between each pair of lines and it is hard to believe that none of these documents has been created using LaTeX. I really haven't been able to figure out how to do it, though.

One thing that I have managed to do in order to alleviate the problem is to change the font of the gloss or the example by adding commands such as the following to the preamble:

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\let\eachwordone=\rmfamily  

This makes things a bit better but here the problem I have is that I cannot make the characters appear in italics by adding the following

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\let\eachwordone=\rmfamily\itshape

With \let\eachwordone= it doesn't seem to be possible to combine font family and font shape.

Thanks in advance for any help you can offer on any of these problems.

I'm including the preamble of the document

Best,

Josep M.

[cgnieder]

Hi Josep,

Welcome to the LaTeX community!

The \let primitive lets one token to be equal to another token. The syntax is:

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\let<token1>=<token2>

or

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\let<token1><token2>

This means if you say

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\let\eachwordone=\rmfamily\itshape

You set \eachwordone to be equal to \rmfamily and then you call \itshape independently.

You may want

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\def\eachwordone{\rmfamily\itshape}

or using the more LaTeX-like syntax

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\renewcommand*\eachwordone{\rmfamily\itshape}

I'm not sure, though. Since you haven't provided a minimal working example I haven't tested this. It also means I cannot comment on the vertical space issue. We would need to see some compilable (but minimal!) code that shows the issue. However, \\~\\ surely is wrong LaTeX syntax.

Regards

[jfontana]

Thanks Clemens!

Sorry about not providing the minimal working example. I include it at the end of this message. I got the changes I wanted in the font shape using \def instead of \let. Thanks for the tip!

As for the additional space, here's one of the long examples I was talking about. Having the example in a different font and shape from the gloss helps quite a bit but if it is possible at all, I would still like to try to increase the space between each pair of example-gloss lines a bit. Hopefully the minimal working example I include below can offer some clues to find an appropriate solution.

I'm a bit confused about your comment on the \\~\\ command. I would swear I got this from the "official" documentation of one of the macros. Not that this would make it right if it is indeed the wrong LaTeX syntax but what I can say is that it works perfectly to add the extra line between the example and the translation and there are no problems or error messages when it compiles.

JM.


--------- minimal working example --------------

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\documentclass{beamer}

\mode<presentation>
{
%\usetheme{Luebeck}
 \usetheme{Frankfurt}
  % or ...
  \setbeamercovered{transparent}
  % or whatever (possibly just delete it)
}

%[...]
\usepackage{fontspec}
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage{xspace}

\usepackage{cgloss4e}

\setmainfont{Trebuchet MS}

\setromanfont[Mapping=tex-text]{Georgia}

\usepackage{linguex}
\usepackage{graphicx}

\nosinglegloss

\def\eachwordone{\rmfamily\itshape}

%[...]

\begin{document}
\begin{frame}{Diachronic data: killing and dying}

\begin{itemize}
\item Killing and dying revisited.
\end{itemize}

\exg. ...\textbf{mataren} Tosadeu e aconseguiren lo gran Tireus famós; e per la reyna Atar dels gots fo \textbf{mort} Darí e Dapís e lurs fills foren vençuts e presos.    \\
 killed.3PL Tosadeu and got the bit Tireus famous; and by the queen Atar {of the} goths was "killed" Darí and Dapís and their sons were defeated and imprisoned. \\
\trans `They killed Tosadey and got the big and famous Tireus; and Darí was killed by Atar, the queen of the Goths, and Dapís and their sons were defeated and imprisoned'
\hfill (\textit{Històries e conquestes del realme d’Aragó e principat de Catalunya})

\end{frame}


%[...]

\end{document}

[cgnieder]

I'm a bit confused about your comment on the \\~\\ command. I would swear I got this from the "official" documentation of one of the macros. Not that this would make it right if it is indeed the wrong LaTeX syntax but what I can say is that it works perfectly to add the extra line between the example and the translation and there are no problems or error messages when it compiles.

Well, this happens if no MWEs are provided apparently the

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\exg ... \\

is the correct syntax for linguex. My comment was due to the fact that way too many LaTeX users use \\ in order to end an paragraph (which it doesn't do) and then wonder why things are looking strange or why they're getting warning messages.

How about this:

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% arara: xelatex
\documentclass{beamer}

\mode<presentation>
  {
    \usetheme{Frankfurt}
    \setbeamercovered{transparent}
  }

\usepackage{fontspec}
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage{xspace}

\usepackage{cgloss4e}
\usepackage{linguex}

\usepackage{graphicx}

\nosinglegloss

\def\eachwordone{\rmfamily\itshape}

\begin{document}

\begin{frame}{Diachronic data: killing and dying}

\begin{itemize}
  \item Killing and dying revisited.
\end{itemize}

\exg. \ldots\textbf{mataren} Tosadeu e aconseguiren lo gran Tireus famós; e
per la reyna Atar dels gots fo \textbf{mort} Darí e Dapís e lurs fills foren
vençuts e presos. \\
killed.3PL Tosadeu and got the bit Tireus famous; and by the queen Atar {of
  the} goths was "killed" Darí and Dapís and their sons were defeated and
imprisoned. \\
\medskip
\trans `They killed Tosadey and got the big and famous Tireus; and Darí was
killed by Atar, the queen of the Goths, and Dapís and their sons were defeated
and imprisoned' \hfill (\textit{Històries e conquestes del realme d’Aragó e
  principat de Catalunya})

\end{frame}

\end{document}

linguex.png (68.92 KiB) Viewed 8563 times

Regards

[jfontana]

Thanks again, Clemens.

In the code you proposed '\medskip' adds extra space between the example and the translation. This works perfectly. This command, however, does not work to add an extra space between each pair of lines containing the example and the gloss. The effect I'm looking for is something like the following with the added space being a little smaller (1.5 lines instead of 2).

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 \documentclass{beamer}

    \mode<presentation>
    {
    \usetheme{Frankfurt}
    \setbeamercovered{transparent}
    }

    \usepackage{fontspec}
    \usepackage{xcolor}
    \usepackage{xspace}

    \usepackage{cgloss4e}
    \usepackage{linguex}

    \usepackage{graphicx}

    \nosinglegloss

    \def\eachwordone{\rmfamily\itshape}

    \begin{document}

    \begin{frame}[squeeze, shrink=12]{Diachronic data: killing and dying}

    \begin{itemize}
    \item Killing and dying revisited.
    \end{itemize}
\medskip

\ldots\textbf{mataren} Tosadeu e aconseguiren lo gran Tireus famós; e \newline
    killed.3PL Tosadeu and got the bit Tireus famous; and \newline \newline
    
    per la reyna Atar dels gots fo \textbf{mort} Darí e Dapís e lurs \newline
     by the queen Atar of he goths was``killed" Darí and Dapís and their  \newline \newline
    
    fills  foren vençuts e presos. \newline
    sons were defeated and imprisoned. \newline \newline
   `They killed Tosadey and got the big and famous Tireus; and Darí was
    killed by Atar, the queen of the Goths, and Dapís and their sons were defeated
    and imprisoned' 
    \hfill (\textit{Històries e conquestes del realme d’Aragó e principat de Catalunya})

    \end{frame}

    \end{document}

[Hiram]

Hi Josep,

I remember trying to work something like this out before, albeit using a slightly different glossing package. Since you're using the cgloss4e.sty I thought I'd take a look at it and see what the options are for changing spacing.

I took your minimal example and ran it through, then copied bits of code from cgloss4e to my document's preamble and added other bits to it until I got something that seemed the work. This is not an ideal situation, being quite a hack - I welcome input from more advanced users on how to change spacing properly (perhaps a new command?).

If you paste the following code into your document's preamble, after having loaded the cgloss4e package, this should change the spacing. I added the \vskip.3\baselineskip (line 11). If you change the number .3 this will adjust the vertical space between paired lines in your example.

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\gdef\twosent#1\\ #2\\{% #1 = first line, #2 = second line
    \getwords(\lineone,\eachwordone)#1 \\%
    \getwords(\linetwo,\eachwordtwo)#2 \\%
    \loop\lastword{\eachwordone}{\lineone}{\wordone}%
         \lastword{\eachwordtwo}{\linetwo}{\wordtwo}%
         \global\setbox\gline=\hbox{\unhbox\gline
                                    \hskip\glossglue
                                    \vtop{\box\wordone   % vtop was vbox
                                       \nointerlineskip
                                          \box\wordtwo
                                          \vskip.3\baselineskip
                                         }%
                                   }%
         \testdone
         \ifnotdone
    \repeat
    \egroup % matches \bgroup in \gloss
   \gl@stop}

The \vskip value is currently .3\baselineskip - you can also replace that whole piece of code with an actual value, say 5pt or something else.

Hope that helps.