Re: Various ConTeXt Questions

["Wolfgang Schuster" <schuster.wolfgang@googlemail.com>]

Hi Edd,

> I am taking a look at conTeXt as a means of typesetting documents with
> more advanced page layouts which otherwise would be produced with
> desktop publishing suites.
>
> I am very new to conTeXt, so I know very little about it. The only
> documentation I have been able to find on the internet is:
> ConTeXt Garden
> ConTeXt an excursion
> ConTeXt : The manual

You can find all manuals from Pragma on their homepage:
http://www.pragma-ade.com/show-man-1.htm

> I have been sifting through these for a while, and whilst the
> documentation is good, I still have questions. I must apologise if I
> missed the answers in the docs or if the questions are just plain
> dumb.
>
> 1) Is there a way to make ConTeXt stricter?
> It seem that ConTeXt will not complain if you misspell the names of
> colours, layers, overlays etc. I would rather it did.
>
> 2) Is there a way to overlay many layers/overlays at one place.
> It seems using background= can only take 1 layer/overlay. Even better
> if I could offset the layer/overlay from an origin.

1. You could set multiple overlays with a comma seperated list and braces before
and after the list.

[...,background={overlay 1,overlay 2,...,overlay n},...]


2. You could use the x and y or offset, hoffset and voffset parameters
for \setlayer
to set the distance from your layer from all four corners of the page,
textblock or any
other pageblock.

> 3) I have had difficulty pushing the whole layout including the margin
> to the right about 2cm.
> I have tried using setuplayout to alter leftedge, leftedgedistance and
> backspace. Is that not the way to do it?

The distance between the left margin of the paper and the left margin of
the textblock is set with the backspace key for \setuplayout.

\setuplayout[backspace=...]

> 3a) Similarly I would like to make the textheight longer so that the
> footer is about 1cm from the bottom of the page. I have had no luck in
> setting textheight using setuplayout.

You could set a fixed value for the footer and let TeX calculate the textheight.

\setuplayout
  [bottomspace=1cm,
   height=fit]

> 4) Is there a module to parse CVS tags, like the RCS package for laTeX?
>
> 5) Can I use OpenType and TrueType fonts in ConTeXt? Ideally via fontspec.

It is possible to use TrueType and OpenType fonts with pdfTeX but this requires
tfm files and a map file.

The easier method is to use XeTeX or LuaTeX as engines and the only thing
you need is a typescript file with the font names and their mapping to ConTeXt's
own font names.

http://wiki.contextgarden.net/Fonts_in_XeTeX (a little bit outdated)
http://wiki.contextgarden.net/Mark_IV#Fonts_and_typescripts (shoudl
also work with XeTeX)

> 6) Is there a book on ConTeXt for beginners aside from what I have
> already listed above?

> 7) Can I specify RGB colours in th 0 <= x <= 255 format?
> So far I have had to write a script to help me convert them.

This is not possible but you could use the hex notation

\setupcolor[hex]
\setupcolors[state=start]

\definecolor[hexred]  [#FF0000]
\definecolor[hexgreen][h=00FF00]

\starttext

\color[hexred]{Red Text}

\color[hexgreen]{Green Text}

\stoptext

> 8) Is anyone proficient with ConTeXt going to the Cork TeX User Group meeting?
>
> Thanks.

Wolfgang
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