On Tue, 20 May 2014, David Carlisle wrote: [...] If you want \mathbf{Var} to "look OK" then you need to kern the V and a and that means (as far as I understand the current situation) either using a text bold font or having tables somewhere in the macro layer and inserting kerns "by hand", that is: make the macros iterate over every character inserting kerns where needed. (but maybe luatex and or xetex can modify the font metrics at font loading time? i think maybe the "proper" thing to do is recommend declaring these multi-letter non-\mathrm strings as a special kind of operator name. may require a new command ... i agree with david that the text kerning is definitely wanted here. -- bb