R help - Aug 2008 - Mtext doesn't display characters in italic when I use a greek symbol

Following on from my previous mail!

plot(1:10,1:10)
mtext("title", side=3, adj=0, font=3, cex=1.5)

This works as expected and puts the font in italics.

tag <- "A)"
suffix <- "genea::"
plot(1:10,1:10)
mtext(bquote(.(tag) ~ Delta * .(suffix)), side=3, adj=0, font=3,
cex=1.5)

Here, the font isn't in italics, it's normal.

I presume this is some interplay with bquote(), or perhaps R doesn't
know the italics version of the capital greek delta character?

Any idea how I can get it into italics?

Thanks
Mick

Head of Informatics
Institute for Animal Health
Compton
Berks
RG20 7NN
01635 578411 

http://www.iah.ac.uk/research/bioinformatics/bioinf.shtml

The information contained in this message may be confide...{{dropped:14}}

On Thu, 7 Aug 2008, michael watson (IAH-C) wrote:
> Following on from my previous mail!
>
> plot(1:10,1:10)
> mtext("title", side=3, adj=0, font=3, cex=1.5)
>
> This works as expected and puts the font in italics.
>
> tag <- "A)"
> suffix <- "genea::"
> plot(1:10,1:10)
> mtext(bquote(.(tag) ~ Delta * .(suffix)), side=3, adj=0, font=3,
> cex=1.5)
>
> Here, the font isn't in italics, it's normal.
>
> I presume this is some interplay with bquote(), or perhaps R doesn't
> know the italics version of the capital greek delta character?
R does, but (yet again) this is a mathematical symbol Delta, not a Greek 
character.  And there is only one font for mathematical symbols and that 
is not italic in R's standard devices (unlike TeX).

I have already told you how to do this -- but on Windows you need an 
up-to-date version of R, so please install an R-devel snapshot from CRAN.

tag <- "A)"
suffix <- "genea::"
plot(1:10,1:10)
mtext(paste(tag, "\u0394", suffix), side=3, adj=0, cex=1.5, font=3)

does work, and it even uses a consistent font.

In future I will only answer follow-up postings that use symbol vs Greek 
character correctly ....
>
> Any idea how I can get it into italics?
>
> Thanks
> Mick
>
> Head of Informatics
> Institute for Animal Health
> Compton
> Berks
> RG20 7NN
> 01635 578411
>
> http://www.iah.ac.uk/research/bioinformatics/bioinf.shtml
>
> The information contained in this message may be confide...{{dropped:14}}
>
> ______________________________________________
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> PLEASE do read the posting guide
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>
-- 
Brian D. Ripley,                  ripley at stats.ox.ac.uk
Professor of Applied Statistics,  http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~ripley/
University of Oxford,             Tel:  +44 1865 272861 (self)
1 South Parks Road,                     +44 1865 272866 (PA)
Oxford OX1 3TG, UK                Fax:  +44 1865 272595