I'm so happy that GW asked her original question. It's always so great to see how others beside the original poster benefit from an answer to a question, Margy!
As far as I can remember, in all my decades of transcribing, I don't recall ever having a job or entity that required no spaces before or after dashes. Of course, I did that for editing jobs, such as dissertations and theses, but not for transcripts. So that scenario never even crosses my mind as a consideration when I'm creating new IT stuff and contemplating sharing it.
We are definitely not a one-size-fits-all group! So this thread has been gold to me to remind me that it would be helpful to incorporate this "expansion after a dash" option in my shared shortcuts and tutorials. And the timing couldn't be more perfect, because it will fit right in with the upcoming "Snippets and more" tutorials I'll be sharing soon. Weird but true!
Thank you, GW, for asking this original question. And thank you, Margy, for reminding me that there's a whole big universe of users (and their unique needs) out there that come in all different flavors!