# \looparrowright but without the arrow tip

What is the easiest way to typeset a symbol like \looparrowright, but without the arrow?

Is there a solution as easy as the answer to this question? I don't know where to look up the definition of \looparrowright, to see for myself whether I could achieve my desired symbol.

• It's a different case: \hookrightarrow is composed with two gliphs, but \looprightarrow isn't. You can clip the symbol, though. – egreg Jul 8 '20 at 15:00
• Just a info: \DeclareMathSymbol{\looparrowright} {\mathrel}{AMSa}{"23} found in amssymb.dtx at ctan.org/tex-archive/fonts/amsfonts. No idea what that means, though. – Dr. Manuel Kuehner Jul 8 '20 at 15:03
• Consider to accept one of the provided answers, I recommend to accept egreg's answer since it covers more situations. – Dr. Manuel Kuehner Jul 8 '20 at 21:15

You can clip the symbol:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amssymb}
\usepackage{trimclip}

\makeatletter
\DeclareRobustCommand{\leftloop}{%
\mathrel{\mathpalette\left@loop\relax}%
}
\newcommand{\left@loop}[2]{%
\vphantom{\looparrowright}
\smash{\clipbox{0 {-.1\height} {.35\width} {-.1\height}}{$\m@th#1{\looparrowright}$}}%
}
\makeatother

\begin{document}

$a\leftloop b_{c\leftloop d}$

\end{document}


Code borrowed from https://tex.stackexchange.com/a/395049/4427

This means “cut nothing on the left, add a negative clip on the bottom, clip 35% of the width from the right, add a negative clip on the top”. Why negative clipping? Because the glyph slightly overshoots its bounding box. So I also smash the clipped symbol and set the height with the help of \vphantom.

Can we keep the round cap? Yes, by adding a clipped minus sign.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amssymb}
\usepackage{trimclip}

\makeatletter
\DeclareRobustCommand{\leftloop}{%
\mathrel{\mathpalette\left@loop\relax}%
}
\newcommand{\left@loop}[2]{%
\smash{\clipbox{0 {-.1\height} {.4\width} {-.1\height}}{$\m@th#1{\looparrowright}$}}%
\clipbox{{0.8\width} 0 0 0}{$\m@th#1-$}%
\mkern-1mu
}
\makeatother

\begin{document}

\fboxrule=0.1pt\fboxsep=0pt\fbox{$\leftloop$}% just to see the bounding box

$a\leftloop b_{c\leftloop d}$

\end{document}


No need to add a phantom, because the minus sign has the right height and depth.

• +1: I tried it myslef with the adjustbox package after I read your comment ("clip it"). The "round cap" is amazing. – Dr. Manuel Kuehner Jul 8 '20 at 15:20
• Please go with eger's answer - I just was inspired by his comment and tried it myself.
• I use the adjustbox package.
• @pros Please indicate if my solution has some problems (apart from being too simplistic).
• This is a trial-and-error approach :).

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amssymb}

\begin{document}

\begin{itemize}
\item \adjustbox{trim = 0 0 1 0, clip}{\fbox{Test $a$}} \fbox{Test $a$}
\item \adjustbox{trim = 0 0 7 0, clip}{\fbox{$\looparrowright$}} \fbox{$\looparrowright$}
\item \adjustbox{trim = 0 0 4 0, clip}{$\looparrowright$}
\end{itemize}

\newcommand{\myLoop}{\adjustbox{trim = 0 0 4 0, clip}{\ensuremath{\looparrowright}}}

\myLoop

\end{document}


• Why go for egreg's answer only? It's a good solution indeed, but I'm looking for the simplest one and yours looks more simple in terms of latex coding. Are there technical reasons to prefer egreg's solution over yours? – frabala Jul 8 '20 at 15:34
• @frabala I am not sure, therefore I put "@pros Please indicate if my solution has some problems (apart from being too simplistic)." in the answer :). – Dr. Manuel Kuehner Jul 8 '20 at 15:48
• I think you forgot $...$ in the definition of \myLoop. @frabala This answer looks simpler but won't scale according to the current math style. The \mathpalette "complication" in egreg's answer does this. Of course, one could easily adapt this answer. – campa Jul 8 '20 at 15:54
• @campa I did not use  in \newcommand on purpose. I just assum that teh commadn will be used in myth mode. Maybe I should add a \ensuremath command :). – Dr. Manuel Kuehner Jul 8 '20 at 17:47
• *math mode, typo in my previous comment. – Dr. Manuel Kuehner Jul 8 '20 at 18:49