How to create a square-root symbol in non-math mode

Question

I wish to write a pure-text square root symbol, like √. The purpose is to write an instruction as it is displayed on a simple calculator, i.e. something like √(2+3). I am aware of $\sqrt{}$ , but I don't want to use this because with an empty argument, the square root-sign is too low compared to the surrounding text. I could fix the position of the symbol using something like $\sqrt{\color{white}{|}}$ (provided I have xcolor loaded) but the result isn't beautiful.

Is there a command to produce the √-symbol (such as we have \$ for $)? Apparently \√ doesn't exist.

Detexify suggests

$\surd$ , which is exactly a math-mode square root sign without argument.
\textsurd (provided the package textcomp) comes close.

I wonder if there is an exact version of √, i.e. as one can use in other text-editors.

How about any of the above suggestions with \newcommand\textsqrtsymbol{\mbox{$\sqrt{\mathstrut}$}} where $\sqrt{\mathstrut}$ can be replaced by whatever produces the symbol most to your liking. — A.Ellett, Dec 08 '14 at 14:29
How you can use the symbol in word processing applications is outside the scope of this site. — egreg, Dec 08 '14 at 14:30
Hmm, perhaps this is a bad question indeed. Shall I delete it? — Bart Michels, Dec 08 '14 at 14:32

karlkoeller · Accepted Answer · 2014-12-08T19:01:20.483

4

You can type the character √ directly if you load inputenc with the option utf8x.

MWE:

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage[utf8x]{inputenc}

\begin{document}

√(2+3)

\end{document}

Output

enter image description here

edited Dec 08 '14 at 19:01

answered Dec 08 '14 at 18:54

karlkoeller

124,410

2

Thanks. Is there any reason why one would not want to load inputenc with utf8x, i.e. does it conflict with other features? – Bart Michels Dec 08 '14 at 21:48

How to create a square-root symbol in non-math mode

1 Answers1