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From: siepo@client44-3.kabelA.oprit.rug.nl
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Subject: Re: beginner's questions
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On 11 Nov, Berend de Boer wrote:
> siepo@client44-3.kabelA.oprit.rug.nl wrote:
> 
>> A dissenting voice: I don't think Context is easier than LaTeX. 
> 
> Hai Siep,
> 
> How many years of LaTeX experience do you have?

In my first year with LaTeX, I designed a custom stylefile, even without
the benefit of the LaTeX Companion.

>> One
>> stumbling block is the documentation - there is a lot of it, but I
>> find it hard to find my way around in it -
> 
> I can't believe the latex docs are better. And consistency across the
> (docs of the) many packages??

Lamports book is concise and to the point. If you can't find something 
there then you can be pretty sure that it is not a built-in user-level 
command or parameter. The guides for the graphics package and the guide 
for class and package writers are models of good documentation.

> But could you be a bit more specific about "hard to find my way around
> it." Because that is at least true for one person in this world, and
> if there is one there are more. So if you can (try to) formulate what
> kind of documentation would have helped you, perhaps this situation
> can be improved.

On the other hand: my first attempt at Context stranded when I tried to
figure out from the beginners manual how to include a figure. When I got
my hands on the regular manual, I had high hopes that now I would have
formal and complete documentation. However, nothing could be further
from the truth: time and again, documentation on parameters is
incomplete. Try to figure out from the official documentation how to set
linespacing for a fontsize. Recall also our discussion on this list on
the syntax of parameter values.

My second attempt at Context stranded due to competing demands on my
time. My third attempt resulted in a set of very basic sample files
(www.pragma-ade.com/pragma-ade/third/siep/samples.zip). It required
quite a bit of correspondence with Hans to complete this set, and I left
various issues unsolved because I was not working towards a specific
layout.

Nowadays, when I am working on existing Context code, with the sources,
the manual, the texshow utility and tons of testfiles all at hand, I
only need to ask Taco every other time how something is supposed to work
in Context.

One problem with the documentation is its informality: it presents
commands and a sometimes incomplete list of parameters. Instead of a
description of all parameters, there is only a series of examples, which
typically don't include the feature I am looking for.

Other problems are really problems of Context itself: there is more of
it than can be documented in a finite amount of time, and some things
are oddly named (e.g. right- and left alignment) or oddly organized
(e.g. you need to define some aspects of page layout via the
\setuppagenumbering macro).

> Groetjes,
> 
> Berend. (-:
> 

Siep