[Tex/LaTex] Underline at the same level

fontsizetext-decorationsvertical alignment

I want to underline alpha's and beta's, but at the same level. I mean, I don't want
but . Maybe there is already a command that make it but I couldn't find it. The second image was obtained with the following command :

$\newlength{\espa}
\settowidth{\espa}{$\alpha$}\rlap{\underline{\hspace{\espa}}}\alpha,
\settowidth{\espa}{$\beta$}\rlap{\underline{\hspace{\espa}}}\beta$

which is hardly working but not totally. In normal math mode, no pbm. In scriptsize (or tiny or anything else) math mode, no pbm. But if I am in math mode within an exponent, then the \settowidth command does not seem to take into account that I am in sciptsize mode and, as a matter of fact, the underline is too long (e.g. ).

Any idea ?

Best Answer

$\underline{\smash{\beta}}$

will do the trick.

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] underline omitting the descenders

We could do for each letter:

Produce the underlining
Overwrite the line with the same but bolder letter or with a left and right shifted one, but in background or white color
Write the letter

So we would get an underline with matching gaps.

Here I modified the soul approach of Marco in this way, just for a demonstration what I mean, which could be improved (boldness, loop):

\setcounter{errorcontextlines}{999}
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[latin1]{inputenc}
\usepackage{soul}
\usepackage{color}
\makeatletter
\newcommand*{\whiten}[1]{\llap{\textcolor{white}{{\the\SOUL@token}}\hspace{#1pt}}}
\DeclareRobustCommand*\myul{%
    \def\SOUL@everyspace{\underline{\space}\kern\z@}%
    \def\SOUL@everytoken{%
     \setbox0=\hbox{\the\SOUL@token}%
     \ifdim\dp0>\z@
        \raisebox{\dp0}{\underline{\phantom{\the\SOUL@token}}}%
        \whiten{1}\whiten{0}%
        \whiten{-1}\whiten{-2}%
        \llap{\the\SOUL@token}%
     \else
        \underline{\the\SOUL@token}%
     \fi}%
\SOUL@}
\makeatother
\begin{document}
\sffamily\Huge
\myul{jumping quickly}
\end{document}

underlining with gaps

[Tex/LaTex] Closer underline

\underline{<stuff>} underlines a box containing <stuff>. However, this also implies that <stuff> with descenders pushes the underline lower. \smash{<stuff>} removes any depth (and height) from <stuff>, allowing for the regular non-descender depth of the underline:

\underline{\smash{<stuff>}}

Alternatively, the soul package provides underlining features. Here's a minimal example:

enter image description here

\documentclass{article}
\setlength{\parindent}{0pt}% Just for this example
\usepackage{soul}% http://ctan.org/pkg/soul
\begin{document}
The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog. \par
\underline{The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.} \par
\underline{\smash{The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.}}

\setul{5pt}{.4pt}% 5pt below contents
\ul{The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.} \par
\setul{1pt}{.4pt}% 1pt below contents
\ul{The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.} \par
\end{document}

See the soul package documentation (section 4 Underlining, p 11 onward) for more information regarding settings and underlining control.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] underline omitting the descenders

[Tex/LaTex] Closer underline

Related Question