some times when i write the double point “:” a strange formatting mark comes after it (i shows it by clicking: view > formatting marks)
what is this? and why it is happening?
LO: Version: 24.2.2.2 (X86_64) / LibreOffice Community
Build ID: 420(Build:2)
CPU threads: 4; OS: Linux 6.9; UI render: default; VCL: kf6 (cairo+wayland)
Locale: ar-DZ (en_US.UTF-8); UI: en-US
24.2.2-2
Calc: threaded
OS: manjaro linux
language: arabic
file format: odt
sample file.odt (14.3 KB)
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Mention OS name, LO version (all 4 numbers at least or a copy of Help>About LO), save format and locale (which language do you use?). Ideally attach a sample file.
Under some locales, colon (what you call “double point”) causes an extra space to be inserted to comply with local typography rules. But here, you say it is inserted after the colon. Then it may be the next character which triggers this insertion. We can’t tell because you clipped too narrow your screenshot. Additionally, a screenshot prevents from from getting the character encoding to know for sure what has been inserted.
I’ve attached an example file
i tried to reproduce it with “:” but now the problem did not occur. i don’t know why, sometimes it happened and others not.
but in the second paragraph is another example when i copy from an exe file launched with wine: i always get the same problem. so what is that character?
if i face it another time with the dots i will attach the file.
This is how non-breaking space is shown starting from version 7.6 (implemented in https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/core/+/149576 for tdf#41652).
Your locale is set to ar_DZ. It probably manages a mix of Arabic and French. U+003A COLON is a punctuation and should be considered “neutral” but it lies in the Unicode Basic Latin block. So it may trigger a switch to French. French typography requires that colon be preceded by a “thin space” which was translated in the ISO-8859-x era by U+00A0 NO-BREAK SPACE (which much is wider than what is specified by the rule).
This is what is inserted. It has a gray background to distinguish it from a normal space. The little ring simply means “space”.
@mikekaganski gave the technical information.