User:SOTO/Forum Archive/The Time Lord Academy/@comment-6433721-20130309061324/@comment-188432-20130309183726

From Tardis Wiki, the free Doctor Who reference

Just for clarity on a point made above, true dashes (or em-dashes) in OS X — since at least 10.3 — have been made with Shift Opt -.

Opt + - actually produces two characters, the simple en-dash (–) and the inequality sign (≠).

Of course, it's super easy to set up a Mac to always simply replace -- with —, so that you don't even have to use any special key presses at all. It'll just make the proper em dash (or © or ® or ⅞ or ⅔ or whatever) as you type.