I am wondering why so many duplicates of a symbol exist in latex. Let me provide some:
For prime I know two types: 1. $f'$
2. $f^\prime$
in Wiki Prime Symbol it is explained why \prime
is introduced:
"LaTeX provides an oversized prime symbol, \prime
for use in subscripts [for example $f_\prime$
]"
Yet I wonder why an oversized symbol? Or the backslash: 1. \backslash
2. \setminus
what is the difference? For a long list of slashes in latex visit unicode slashes. I can't understand why so many duplicates and if I don't know the difference, maybe I use it in wrong place. BTW I don't mean the characters that have minor differences (like \nu
and \upsilon
which look nearly the same).
How can I make sure I am using the correct symbol despite the similar look? What is the real difference between them?
\backslash
/\setminus
, from TeXbook: "It’s customary to say$G\backslash H$
to denote double cosets of G by H (G\H), and$p\backslash n$
to mean that p divides n (p\n); but$X\setminus Y$
denotes the elements of set X minus those of set Y (X \ Y). Both operations use the same symbol, but\backslash
is type Ord, while\setminus
is type Bin (so TEX puts more space around it)."