How to Manage Smart Quotes (All)

This is a portion of an article that originally appeared in the ClarisWorks Journal, the monthly publication of the ClarisWorks Users Group, Box 701010, Plymouth, MI 48170; (313) 454-1969; Fax: (313) 454-1965. Copyright ClarisWorks Users Group; reprinted with permission.

This information was provided by Claris Corporation on 16 March 1998, and incorporated into Apple Computer's Tech Info Library.

When you look at a ClarisWorks or ClarisImpact document, you will see that the program automatically implements some typographic features that enhance the quality of your printed material. Most obvious is the use of "printer's quotes" or "curly quotes" (the curly single and double quotation marks such as " and ') instead of standard Macintosh quotation marks (such as " or '). Printer's quotes add an elegant touch to your printouts.

Smart Quotes

ClarisWorks and ClarisImpact use a feature called "Smart Quotes" to put printer's quotes in your documents. The Smart Quotes feature looks at the character to the left of the insertion point and then determines whether an opening or closing quotation mark should appear in that location. By monitoring the insertion points, ClarisWorks automatically converts an opening or closing quotation mark into a printer's quote.

However, there are at least two situations when Smart Quotes are inappropriate. First, there are times when you may not want those fancy quotes (for example, when you use an apostrophe to abbreviate a length in "feet", a quotation mark to indicate "inches", or when preparing documents to be sent by modem). Second, there are times when Smart Quotes gets confused (for example, when you start a quote directly after another character, such as a left parenthesis).


Fooling Smart Quotes

Fortunately, there are workarounds that make it easy to overcome both of these problems. For example, you can follow these steps to force Smart Quotes to enter an opening quote:

1. Put the cursor where you want the opening quote to appear.

2. Press the Space Bar to insert a space. You will delete that space later, but now it signals Smart Quotes to type an opening quote.

3. Press the Quotation Mark Key to enter the opening quote character.

4. Move the cursor to the left of the opening quote character.

5. Press the Delete Key to delete the unwanted space.

Similarly, you can force ClarisWorks and ClarisImpact to type a closing quote by typing any character other than a space, typing the quotation mark, and then deleting the extra character. This can be useful when typing abbreviations for years, as in '92.

Turning off Smart Quotes

Turning off Smart Quotes gives you less attractive output but avoids occasional problems associated with using printer's quotes. With Smart Quotes disabled, ClarisWorks and ClarisImpact enter straight quotation marks in your documents. To turn off Smart Quotes in Claris Works, select "Preferences" from the Edit Menu (Layout Menu in ClarisImpact)and click in the Smart Quotes box on the Preferences Dialog Box. Standard (straight) quotation marks will then be entered in the current document until you reactivate Smart Quotes. [Ed: Note that the default setting for Smart Quotes in any new document is "on." However, Smart Quotes can be turned off when you prepare a Stationery file. Thereafter, documents prepared from the Stationery file will have Smart Quotes turned off.]


Remember to turn off Smart Quotes for any documents you will send by modem. The characters used by ClarisWorks for Smart Quotes do not match the ASCII character set. Thus, transmitted documents prepared with printer's quotes will usually contain a plus sign (+) in the place of either the single or double printer's quotes.

Getting Printer's Quotes When You Want Them

Fortunately, you can still get printer's quotes in your documents when you want them. Just press Option-[ to enter an opening double-quote and Shift-Option-[ to enter a closing double-quote. Similarly, Option-] and Shift-Option-] enter opening and closing single-quotes, respectively.

Published Date: Feb 18, 2012