[Tex/LaTex] The font of operator names

amsmathfontsmath-modemath-operatorssans-serif

What is the correct way of having all operator names be set in, say, sans serif? Saying

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\makeatletter
\def\operator@font{\sf}
\makeatother
\DeclareMathOperator\operator{operator}
\begin{document}
An $\operator 1$.
\end{document}

seems to do the trick, but amsopn.sty defines

\def\operator@font{\mathgroup\symoperators}

which seems to do more…

It would be nice if there were a @-free way of doing this, by the way.

Best Answer

You can define a new symbol font, and also redefine \mathsf to use it, otherwise you'd waste a math group and there are only 16 of them:

\DeclareSymbolFont{sfoperators}{OT1}{cmss}{m}{n}
\DeclareSymbolFontAlphabet{\mathsf}{sfoperators}

\makeatletter
\def\operator@font{\mathgroup\symsfoperators}
\makeatother
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