Thread: Printing Fractions

Did you mean like this?


⅓

Not sure with regards to what application but you could run "charmap" (assuming you have Windows). This will list all the characters available to you for the font you choose. You can then select and copy the one you want, not much of a fraction selection but it might be OK.

In Word, I can go Insert > Symbol. In the dialog box I can choose the font called "MS Reference 2". This option has lots of math symbols & fractions like you want. But they will probably work only in Gatesware.

MS Reference 2 is not one of the hundreds of fonts I have installed. It appears to have shown up along with some app I installed. The file is msref2.ttf

The keyboard can access the font symbols but it is not very logical so use the dialog.

None of the standard fonts have numerals as fractions with the horizontal bar
1
_
2

but some word processor packages have a maths pack extension for the insertion of formulae into documents. They support the horizontal fraction bar.

In Microsoft Word you can go to the "insert" menu and click on "symbol" and it has the fraction signs there for you to insert in your document.

Here is a link to the ALT Codes that has a lot of the characters that you can do on the fly.

http://www.coloryourprofyle.com/phade/alt.html

Thanks Bazza that is a great link
les

There can be a variety of problems with creating fractions and getting them to stay as intended.

There would have to be in excess of 2000 fonts available to computers with software developed in the last ten years. Most computers (Mac, Windows, Linux, various versions) would have 20 to 60 fonts installed by the operating system, and other fonts installed along with application software.
While its safe to assume that something that you can use on your computer, with your installed software and fonts will remain available on your computer, its hard to guarantee that it will present the same way on a different computer if you intend to send it to someone electronically. There are a number of reasons for this.

Software has a range of levels (e.g. Notepad, Wordpad, Works, and Word in the Windows family) and as the levels increase, the programmes have greater capability. But if you use features in higher level software, and someone else’s software is more basic, it may not be able to display the fraction created as you wish.

While all English language (or other language group) text fonts have a common 127 base character set, fractions, other symbols, and accented characters are extended characters and character displayed will vary from font to font. If you chosen to use character 200 in Fancyfont in a document, and distribute the document to someone with identical software, but no installed copy of Fancyfont, their computer will substitute an available font with a similar basic typeface. However there is no certainty that the extended characters in the font will be the same.

There is variation between extended character sets across different software platforms as well, so using extended characters in Word under Windows, and transporting to Word under a Mac may produce unexpected results.

The PDF system was created many years ago to overcome these problems. This system has freely available reader programmes for most common platforms and commercial or shareware generator programs as well. Creators format their information as they see fit, process it with a PDF generator and save the resultant file. The file can then be distributed and viewed as the creator intended on any platform with the free reader software.
Fractions are also poorly represented in general text fonts. If you are lucky, you get ¼,½ and ¾. Beyond that you need Maths or Symbol font sets. It is often easier to generate fractions by judicious formatting of standard characters.

In terms of creating the fraction initially, there are a number of ways to do this, with advantages and disadvantages depending on circulation requirements and software available.

The most universal method, provided that you have mid level or higher software (equiv to Works or Word or higher) would be to type in the fraction (1/3), select the top line components (1), use Format, Font, Superscript, OK to reduce the size of the top line components to about 55% of normal, and align the top of the characters with the top of other characters on the line, then select the lower line components (3) and use Format, Font, Subscript, to reduce them, and align their base to the base of the surrounding text. See screen grab attachments below for generating in Word. The last pic contains the word Done in unformatted text as a size reference. Pro’s. Will work with any text font on any platform as it is only using standard characters which are universal. The expression will remain intact if transferred to lower feature software, although the superscript/subscript formatting may be lost. Con’s. Generating software needs superscript/subscript formatting capabilities.

The next method would be to use the Insert Symbol or Insert Special Character command, locate the symbol required and insert it into the text. Pro’s. Quick and easy. Con’s Generating software needs to support the command, may display unexpected results if distributed to other machines due to problems with font not being installed, or different extended character allocation across platforms.

The next method would be to use a Character Map program to locate the symbol, then copy it and paste it into the required location. Pro’s. Manual version of Insert Symbol or Insert Special Character will work with generating software that does not support those commands. Con’s. More user knowledge required, plus as per Insert Symbol above.

Use an ALT number sequence (i.e. Hold the ALT key down and type in an appropriate number on the numerical keypad). Pro’s. Should work with any software on any platform. Con’s. Needs a reference chart or very good operator memory. Uses Extended Character Set which varies font to font and platform to platform so may not be reliable.

Sorry this is long winded but hope it is usefull for you.

Examples from Word pro and ms Works. MS Word has similar.