[XeTeX] Migrating from LaTeX to XeLaTeX: issues

[dartar]

Dear all,

I'm writing my PhD dissertation in LaTeX. I'm using TeXShop on a Mac 
and I've recently considered the idea of switching to XeLaTeX.
I've made some tests to make Hoefler Text the default roman font and 
the results so far are impressive.
Great work, guys!

There are still a number of issues I've not been able to solve. Could 
any of you please tell me if they have been already addressed in this 
mailing list or if they are still unresolved?

a) CSync problem

When compiling some chapters I get the following critical error message.

"Error creating cg colorspace from csync profileBroken pipe"

The error stops the compilation.

b) Quotation marks and em dashes

I use everywhere in my chapters “curly” quotation marks . I've read 
that in order for XeLaTeX to correctly parse the document I should use 
"standard" quotation marks. I'm reluctant to replace all the 
occurrences of curly quotation marks, because I'd like to keep my 
document compatible with LaTeX. Isn't there any hack to have the 
XeLaTeX engine parse curly quotation marks as standard ones without 
modifying the whole source?
Same problem with the long dash "--" that XeLaTeX does not convert into 
"–". Any quick workaround?

c) tocloft

I was using the tocloft package for formatting my toc, but it seems 
that after the second XeLaTeX compilation (which I need for formatting 
the bibliography and index) this package disrupts the layout of the 
whole document. Is anyone else experiencing the same problem?

d) pictures

I've correctly added the xetex option when declaring the use the 
graphicx package in the preamble. But still the images are not resized 
as they should and they collapse with the surrounding text. Any idea 
how to solve this?


Thanks in advance for your help.

Best,


Dario