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Based from the answers from this question, \\ should not be used to make line breaks. However, \mbox seems to do the same effect. Is this a valid way to make line breaks?

By the way, the 'line break' that I am referring to is something like \n\n.

This MWE is the one I am talking about.

\documentclass[10pt]{article}

\begin{document}
    Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Ut feugiat tortor ut felis consectetur,
a porta dolor fermentum. Praesent sit amet maximus sem. Aliquam rhoncus dapibus commodo. Vestibulum 
hendrerit ultrices porta. Aliquam ac nunc in arcu posuere euismod. Integer molestie dictum mauris, 
quis varius mauris condimentum in. Integer in erat sodales, elementum purus eget, pretium nulla. 
Suspendisse potenti.

    \mbox{}
    
    Proin placerat elit nec quam tempus consectetur. Aenean ac ante mattis, pellentesque velit a, 
venenatis ipsum. Sed diam ipsum, sagittis quis mollis vel, dictum a nisi. Fusce congue fermentum 
libero, et sollicitudin mauris. Pellentesque rutrum tellus sit amet diam commodo, ac viverra 
tellus mollis. Proin et eleifend sapien, vitae fermentum mauris. Praesent vitae eros ex. Nullam 
tincidunt efficitur urna, ac feugiat urna. Cras sollicitudin quam quis augue convallis imperdiet. 
\end{document}
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4
  • 1
    If you do need vertical space between two particular paragraphs, use \bigskip or \medskip, not \mbox{}. But think whether the vertical space serves a real purpose. Word processors have introduced really bad habits: it's easy to hit return twice in a row, but is it really necessary for the reader?
    – egreg
    Jun 27, 2021 at 15:12
  • It just feels easier to read when there is a vertical space between paragraphs. For me, a vertical space is much more noticeable than an indent. Is it bad though?
    – soupless
    Jun 27, 2021 at 15:26
  • 3
    Then look at the parskip package. The indent has been used for a few centuries and people are very accustomed to it.
    – egreg
    Jun 27, 2021 at 15:33
  • 2
    using \mbox in that way is completely wrong, you want to add vertical space not a horizontal line of text with no text. Apart from being logically wrong it will do completely the wrong thing at a page break.
    – David Carlisle
    Jun 27, 2021 at 16:08

1 Answer 1

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3

Short answer: No.

Longer answer:

If adding \mbox{} will be treated by LaTeX exactly as if you had added \mbox{some text} so although it is "white" it is a horizontal line of text not a vertical space. It will not be dropped at a page break so typically the page following this hidden paragraph will appear to start too low down the page as there is a white paragraph at the top of the page. It will also not be seen as vertical space when latex merges space around display environments and section headings.

If you want a style (as on this site) with vertical space between paragraphs, you shoudl use no indent and want to add space not an empty line of text. The easiest way if using a standard class such as article is to add \usepackage{parskip}.

Other classes such as Koma script classes have specific options to choose that layout.

Here is your text without \mbox set by the NTG artikel3 class for example

enter image description here

\documentclass[10pt]{artikel3}

\begin{document}
    Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Ut feugiat tortor ut felis consectetur,
a porta dolor fermentum. Praesent sit amet maximus sem. Aliquam rhoncus dapibus commodo. Vestibulum 
hendrerit ultrices porta. Aliquam ac nunc in arcu posuere euismod. Integer molestie dictum mauris, 
quis varius mauris condimentum in. Integer in erat sodales, elementum purus eget, pretium nulla. 
Suspendisse potenti.


    
    Proin placerat elit nec quam tempus consectetur. Aenean ac ante mattis, pellentesque velit a, 
venenatis ipsum. Sed diam ipsum, sagittis quis mollis vel, dictum a nisi. Fusce congue fermentum 
libero, et sollicitudin mauris. Pellentesque rutrum tellus sit amet diam commodo, ac viverra 
tellus mollis. Proin et eleifend sapien, vitae fermentum mauris. Praesent vitae eros ex. Nullam 
tincidunt efficitur urna, ac feugiat urna. Cras sollicitudin quam quis augue convallis imperdiet. 
\end{document}
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2
  • Does that mean that indentfirst can't be used together with parskip?
    – soupless
    Jun 28, 2021 at 5:42
  • @soupless you could do (and set parindent non-zero) but using indentation and vertical spacing at the same time is a bit unusual.
    – David Carlisle
    Jun 28, 2021 at 8:18

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