Weird Selection Bug

[dunx]

Scrivener v 0.1.1b
Mac OS X v10.4.3

Just noticed this odd behaviour while working on a chapter of my NaNo. I was working in a separate editor window, but the same thing seems to happen in outline view.

Reproduce as follows:

1. type the word "difficult"
2. use Shift+Alt+left arrow to select the word
3. use Shift+right arrow to unselect the first few characters
4. the cursor will not move past the second 'f'.

The weird thing is that this is only happens with words where an 'i' follows a 'ff'. So, "diffident" exhibits the same behaviour, "iffy" does not. The minimal case is "ffi".

[amberv]

Work-around: select menu option, Format > Font > Ligature > Use None. You should now have no problems selecting things. For some reason, ligatures are causing a problem. 'fi' is something that gets connected by default. I forget what all of the standard ligatures are, so I did not test them all.

[amberv]

Seeing as how that seems to be an odd bug for a program to have when using a standard text widget, I tried reproducing this in TextEdit, and sure enough, the bug exists there to. So, it looks like Keith is off the hook.

[KB]

This really is a weird one - and I'm glad it has nothing to do with me. Ligatures are a weird one in OS X. They cause slight problems with the annotation highlighting, too. For instance, if you tried to highlight only the "f" in "fl", you would see both letters highlighted. Not major, but mildly annoying; and nothing I can do about it.

Anyway, back on-topic: I have done all I can do about this one and submitted a bug report (basically a copy-and-paste of dunx's steps) to Apple.

Thanks,
Keith

[KB]

Quick follow-up: Apple replied to my bug report with this:

After further investigation it has been determined that this is a known issue, which is currently being investigated by engineering.

So we just have to wait for a future update of OS X to fix it.

[dunx]

OK.

Not that it's a killer bug or anything, it's just _weird_.