[XeTeX] Defining a ligature-like macro

[Philipp Reichmuth]

Will Robertson schrieb:
> On 11/16/06, James Crippen <jcrippen at gmail.com> wrote:
>> What I'd like to have is something like a ligature such that when I
>> type "kh", depending on some variable setting I either get "kh" or
>> "\ul{k}" (or a similar macro) as the output.
> 
> This is unfortunately impossible in TeX and XeTeX.

If he uses this for transliteration, I guess he could write a macro for 
transliterating entire words that does the substitution for all of its 
argument, and then go \mymacroname{khwaan}.  That has the added effect 
that there is logical markup for transliterated text, so that you can 
e.g. automatically have every transliterated piece typeset in italics 
and that it is easier to go through your document for corrections.  I 
used to do something like this for Arabic and Persian transliteration.

Philipp