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I find that many apps highlight phrases like "high level", insisting an hyphenation. The highlighting is distracting. Based on this page and this page, the hyphenation is needed when referring to "high-level information" but not for "high level of information".

I didn't quite follow the logic, but tried to stress test the logic anyway. For example, "car lot" seems reasonable, as does "small car lot". As does "small car repair lot" and "damaged small car repair intake lot". I wouldn't hyphenate any of these. Is the logic for hyphenation actually sound? Can someone explain it in simpler terms and provide unequivocal examples?

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    Articles and prepositions can break up a long sequence of nouns. Rephrasing, "An intake lot for the repair of small cars." The 'damaged' can be omitted since that is implied by 'repair'.
    – Weather Vane
    Commented Mar 14 at 20:35
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    You seem to have made up the example starting from "small car lot". Is that a small lot for cars, or a lot for small cars?
    – Weather Vane
    Commented Mar 14 at 20:45
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    In speech, the intonation can provide the intended meaning, and of course has no hyphens. But in writing the long string of nouns can be difficult to parse, or not look very fluent with so many hyphens. Structure the sentence with more care, or choose to make it awkward. We use a lot of articles and prepositions in English to link the parts of a sentence.
    – Weather Vane
    Commented Mar 14 at 20:49
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    @EdwinAshworth I think I've heard it expressed ironically as "eschew obfuscation"
    – Barmar
    Commented Mar 14 at 23:55
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    The em-dash — and the en-dash – are different from the hyphen - (and have very different uses, in general). — , – //// -.
    – Edwin Ashworth
    Commented Mar 15 at 15:51

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