# Complex nomenclature entries in LyX

When I try to make a particularly complex nomenclature entry - in particular, inserting curly braces, and in specific, $E_{\left(A_i|B_I\right)}$ - the result simply doesn't appear in when the nomenclature entry later in the document. Everything else works fine - subscripts included, it's just the braces that seem to be broken.

• Welcome to TeX.SE! You should type \{ and \} instead of just { and } to generate curly braces. Separately, you may also want to consider typing \mid instead of | to denote the "conditional on" or "given that" relational operator. Using \mid (note the space after "mid") will give you much better spacing. – Mico Dec 27 '13 at 11:18
• \mid is a good idea, I'll do that. In the former case, though, I don't want visible curly braces - I just want to have the entire \left(A_i|B_i\right) in the subscript. (Also, LyX yells at me if I try to leave them out, and if I escape the curly braces then as expected only the left curly brace is in the subscript.) – linkhyrule5 Dec 27 '13 at 11:25
• Thanks for providing this clarification. Please post a complete MWE (minimum working example -- something that starts with \documentclass{...} and ends with \end{document}) that generates the problem behavior you're looking to fix. – Mico Dec 27 '13 at 11:28
• You don't need \left and \right. – egreg Dec 27 '13 at 11:49
• @linkhyrule5 please post a .lyx minimal example. .lyx is just a text file so open it up, copy, and paste in here. Note that LyX uses a different format than LaTeX (although LyX is able to export to LaTeX). – scottkosty Dec 27 '13 at 21:39

Mico's suggestion to use \mid instead of | is not only for style but will fix your problem:

$E_{\left(A_i\mid B_I\right)}$

EDIT: as egreg notes, \left( and \right) do nothing as far as LaTeX is concerned here and in some cases they can add an unwanted space. I leave them here because that's what the OP has. Note that LyX renders the corresponding math differently (the left( and \right) parentheses are larger in LyX).

output:

Here is an MWE .lyx file:

\lyxformat 413
\begin_document
\textclass article
\use_default_options true
\maintain_unincluded_children false
\language english
\language_package default
\inputencoding auto
\fontencoding global
\font_roman default
\font_sans default
\font_typewriter default
\font_default_family default
\use_non_tex_fonts false
\font_sc false
\font_osf false
\font_sf_scale 100
\font_tt_scale 100
\graphics default
\default_output_format default
\output_sync 0
\bibtex_command default
\index_command makeindex -g
\paperfontsize default
\spacing single
\use_hyperref false
\papersize default
\use_geometry false
\use_amsmath 1
\use_esint 1
\use_mathdots 1
\use_mhchem 1
\cite_engine basic
\use_bibtopic false
\use_indices false
\paperorientation portrait
\suppress_date false
\use_refstyle 1
\index Index
\shortcut idx
\color #008000
\end_index
\secnumdepth 3
\tocdepth 3
\paragraph_separation indent
\paragraph_indentation default
\quotes_language english
\papercolumns 1
\papersides 1
\paperpagestyle default
\tracking_changes false
\output_changes false
\html_math_output 0
\html_css_as_file 0
\html_be_strict false

\begin_body

\begin_layout Standard
\begin_inset CommandInset nomenclature
LatexCommand nomenclature
symbol "$E_{\\left(A_i\\mid B_I\\right)}$"
description "description..."

\end_inset

\end_layout

\begin_layout Standard
\begin_inset CommandInset nomencl_print
LatexCommand printnomenclature
set_width "auto"

\end_inset

\end_layout

\end_body
\end_document

And exported to LaTeX (pdflatex):

%% Do not edit unless you really know what you are doing.
\documentclass[english]{article}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[latin9]{inputenc}
\usepackage{nomencl}
% the following is useful when we have the old nomencl.sty package
\providecommand{\printnomenclature}{\printglossary}
\providecommand{\makenomenclature}{\makeglossary}
\makenomenclature
\usepackage{babel}
\begin{document}
\nomenclature{$E_{\left(A_i\mid B_I\right)}$}{description...}

\settowidth{\nomlabelwidth}{$E_{\left(A_i\mid B_I\right)}$}
\printnomenclature{}
\end{document}
• You should tell me what \left and \right are doing. In this case nothing at all, in other cases they add an unwanted space (and do nothing to the delimiters). – egreg Dec 27 '13 at 22:18
• That did it. Do you know why? – linkhyrule5 Dec 31 '13 at 15:23
• @linkhyrule5 I'm not sure if this is related, but a search of the manual for "|" gives that 'German users who want to use the shortcut notation "a instead of \"a have to redefine the quote character in nomencl.ist to something other than " (and |, @, !)' – scottkosty Dec 31 '13 at 21:16