No italic correction in ConTeXt

Question

Quoting ConTeXt garden,

There is a font switch \em to emphasize text. This is somewhat special: it does automatic italic correction and changes the alternative depending on the current alternative.

But that is false in the current MKIV version in TL15. In fact, it seems impossible to obtain italic correction at all; \/ has no effect. Compare the ConTeXt code below to the corresponding LaTeX code. How can I get italic correction, preferably automatic?

\starttext

{\em Beef} beer.\par
{\em Beef\/} beer.\par
{\it Beef} beer.\par
{\it Beef\/} beer.

\stoptext

\documentclass{article}

\begin{document}

{\em Beef} beer.\par
{\em Beef\/} beer.\par
{\it Beef} beer.\par
{\it Beef\/} beer.

\end{document}

Answer 1

According to Hans some fonts look weird when italic correction is applied. That is why italic correction is disabled by default in ConTeXt. (In fact, most features are disabled by default in ConTeXt)

To have italic correction enabled you have define the corresponding font feature

\definefontfeature
  [italic]
  [default]
  [itlc=yes]

Now you can add the italic feature to your fonts to have fine grained control over which fonts receive italic correction. The itlc feature does not only take yes as a parameter but it can also be the factor of correction as in itlc=5. Details on this can be found in Fonts out of ConTeXt, also known as »the new font manual«.

Italic correction can be automatically applied in ConTeXt. For example it is highly desirable to have the correction in

{\em Beef} beer

This can be set up using \setupitaliccorrection[text]. There are also other options

• global always apply correction
• text apply correction to text
• always correction between text and boxes
• none forget about correction