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From this question on SU;

Notice the u in chromium isn't italic, as it should be, given the situation. However, you can't do something like that (although the prettify box says you can), so do we need something like

*Ch*romi[blank]*u*[blank]m

to allow such a string to be posted?

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3
  • @SonictheAnonymousHedgehog this question was asked almost 5 years earlier than that one
    – Picachieu
    Commented Nov 15, 2018 at 2:10
  • @publicstaticvoidmain This question was asked specifically to address the use-case of intra-word emphasis. This has since been implemented, so this question is no longer relevant. To direct people to the newer one, it's better to close this as a duplicate. Read our FAQ on duplicate closures.
    – Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog
    Commented Nov 15, 2018 at 2:22
  • all the things I never knew...
    – Picachieu
    Commented Nov 15, 2018 at 2:27

3 Answers 3

Reset to default
10

Just use the <i> tag: <i>Ch</i>romi<i>u</i>m -> Chromium

Ok, if you really want your blank, use a zero-width space. It's Unicode char 0x200B, and you can use it like this: Chromi&#x200B;*u*&#x200B;m -> Chromi​u​m

(or, like this... Chromi​*u*​m -> Chromi​u​m - though this doesn't make a good demo, since by definition the character doesn't show up!)

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1
  • +1 for solving this problem, but it'd still be nice to have a blk tag, or some such thing.
    – Phoshi
    Commented Oct 24, 2009 at 22:40
1

No.

markdown.pl (the reference implementation of Markdown) supports intra-word-empasis, without the magical blank character you propose:

$ echo "Ex*amp*le" | perl markdown.pl
<p>Ex<em>amp</em>le</p>

This is disabled in the Stack Overflow version of Markdown, because it's annoying more often than not.. You have a very few cases where you want my_example_variable to display as myexamplevariable, instead of my_example_variable

If you really want intra-word emphasis, just use the relevant HTML tags as Shog9 suggested:

<i>Ch</i>romi<i>u</i>m

I really recommend against using the Unicode zero-width-space character... The equivalent &#x200B; escape sequence seems reasonable, although it's less obvious and harder to read than simply using the HTML tags.

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  • I realise WHY the inter-word stuff was disabled, and certainly wouldn't want it back, but I've seen blank characters used to great effect in many places - more powerful markup is never a bad thing, right?
    – Phoshi
    Commented Oct 25, 2009 at 0:25
  • I don't see much benefit for this new bit of syntax.. The cases where you'd need it are pretty obscure, it would further diverging SO's markdown from "the standard", and there is a perfectly good, very readable alternative, which wouldn't require users to remember another bit of syntax (HTML tags, or &#x200B;)
    – dbr
    Commented Oct 25, 2009 at 13:42
-1

I am confused. You say that the u isnt italic, but this Markdown content:

*Ch*romi*u*m

does make it italic: Chromium

If you wanted to stop that, you can add a backslash:

*Ch*romi\*u*m

Result: Chromi*u*m

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1
  • 2
    "asked Oct 24 '09" — The behavior was changed in 2014 with this post
    – Laurel
    Commented Nov 15, 2018 at 1:13

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