Sidebars and versals Oh my!

Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[John Culleton]

Been working my way through the examples in the Columns Manual, the Details 
Manual etc.  and had some thoughts on additional features.

Versals come in many different flavors, of which the conventional dropped cap 
is just one. Even that facility could use a tweak. Conventionally, to provide 
a transition from the dropped cap to the normal text, the rest of the first 
word, or the next two or three words, or sometimes the entire first line is 
put in a small caps typeface. I cobbled up my own macro for this for a 
particular book I typeset:

\def\drop#1#2{%
\noindent
{\head #1}
\vskip -20pt
\noindent
\hangindent=1.7em
\hangafter=-2
{\sc #2}
}

But this is not the only type of versal. Sometimes a large capital letter 
(perhaps in italics) is centered on the top of the textblock thus:

\def\drop#1#2{\noindent\hglue .4\hsize{\tfd#1}{\sc#2}}

Now there are other variations seen in fine books, such as a dropped initial 
cap partly or completely protruding into the left margin, often colored gray.
The first macro above could be modified for a specific case.  A general macro 
is more challenging. 

A matter of continuing interest is the sidebar, which can be placed in the 
outer margin, or flush left or right in a paragraph, or partly protruding 
into the outer margin. Usually these sidebars will have a gray background and 
often have a border. It appears that creating the sidebar separately as a pdf 
graphic and then importing and placing it would be the easiest way home. 
Context already has mechanisms for flowing or wrapping text around a graphic. 
How well the wraparound feature works when more than one short paragraph is 
involved I have not tested yet.  

In any case I will continue to explore these layout features, and if anything 
interesting shows up I will share. 

-- 
John Culleton

Short list of publishing/marketing books:
http://wexfordpress.com/tex/shortlist.pdf

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[h h extern]

John Culleton wrote:

> But this is not the only type of versal. Sometimes a large capital letter 
> (perhaps in italics) is centered on the top of the textblock thus:

Did you look into supp-fun.tex?

> A matter of continuing interest is the sidebar, which can be placed in the 
> outer margin, or flush left or right in a paragraph, or partly protruding 
> into the outer margin. Usually these sidebars will have a gray background and 
> often have a border. It appears that creating the sidebar separately as a pdf 
> graphic and then importing and placing it would be the easiest way home. 
> Context already has mechanisms for flowing or wrapping text around a graphic. 
> How well the wraparound feature works when more than one short paragraph is 
> involved I have not tested yet.  

the mp based background mechanism can handle that: see plus-rul.tex

(there is also another mechanism available which permits rather nasty variants 
but i still had no time to document it, so it's currently a hidden feature)


Hans

-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
      tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                              | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Adam Lindsay]

h h extern said this at Sun, 26 Dec 2004 21:33:44 +0100:

>> Context already has mechanisms for flowing or wrapping text around a
>graphic. 
>> How well the wraparound feature works when more than one short
paragraph is 
>> involved I have not tested yet.  
>
>the mp based background mechanism can handle that: see plus-rul.tex
>
>(there is also another mechanism available which permits rather nasty
>variants 
>but i still had no time to document it, so it's currently a hidden feature)

plus-rul is interesting, but I'm 98% certain that when John talks about
sidebars, he means what you call intermezzos. My interpretation, using
the things I do know (or figured out this morning):

\setupfloat [intermezzo] 
   [leftmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    rightmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    default=outer]
\setupcaption[intermezzo][location=none]
\starttext
\showframe
\input ward
\placeintermezzo{}{\framedtext[width=7cm]{\tfx\input dawkins }}
\dorecurse{3}{\input knuth \par}
\stoptext

What I don't know, however, is: 1) how to force a width on flowed text
within a float without resorting to the internal \framedtext, or 2) how
to use this with \splitfloat, which is what I suspect people who think
about sidebars (intermezzo texts) are going to be worried about in a
batch-based system. 
-- 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
 Adam T. Lindsay, Computing Dept.     atl@comp.lancs.ac.uk
 Lancaster University, InfoLab21        +44(0)1524/510.514
 Lancaster, LA1 4WA, UK             Fax:+44(0)1524/510.492
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[John Culleton]

On Monday 27 December 2004 06:33, Adam Lindsay wrote:
> h h extern said this at Sun, 26 Dec 2004 21:33:44 +0100:
> >> Context already has mechanisms for flowing or wrapping text around a
> >
> >graphic.
> >
> >> How well the wraparound feature works when more than one short
>
> paragraph is
>
> >> involved I have not tested yet.
> >
> >the mp based background mechanism can handle that: see plus-rul.tex
> >

> >(there is also another mechanism available which permits rather nasty
> >variants
> >but i still had no time to document it, so it's currently a hidden
> > feature)
>
> plus-rul is interesting, but I'm 98% certain that when John talks about
> sidebars, he means what you call intermezzos. My interpretation, using
> the things I do know (or figured out this morning):

Adam is right. Think of an "intermezzo" with a gray background but either in 
the margin,or placed in the outer part of the text block like an 
illustration, or protruding from the text block. The term "sidebar" is 
American magazine usage.  Generally a sidebar in this sense contains a 
summary of the contents of the page or repeats an important point.

 Bill McClain in his tutorial covers an in margin sidebar but without the gray 
background which can be tricky.  The Context Manual gives examples of 
graphics in the text block with text flowing around them.  The Details Manual 
shows graphics protruding into the margin, but I would envision protruding no 
more than 50% of the width of the inserted item.

I will play with the code below to see what luck I have. 
>
> \setupfloat [intermezzo]
>    [leftmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
>     rightmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
>     default=outer]
> \setupcaption[intermezzo][location=none]
> \starttext
> \showframe
> \input ward
> \placeintermezzo{}{\framedtext[width=7cm]{\tfx\input dawkins }}
> \dorecurse{3}{\input knuth \par}
> \stoptext
>
> What I don't know, however, is: 1) how to force a width on flowed text
> within a float without resorting to the internal \framedtext, or 2) how
> to use this with \splitfloat, which is what I suspect people who think
> about sidebars (intermezzo texts) are going to be worried about in a
> batch-based system.

-- 
John Culleton

Short list of publishing/marketing books:
http://wexfordpress.com/tex/shortlist.pdf

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Adam Lindsay]

John Culleton said this at Mon, 27 Dec 2004 10:10:06 -0500:

>Adam is right. Think of an "intermezzo" with a gray background but either in 
>the margin,or placed in the outer part of the text block like an 
>illustration, or protruding from the text block. The term "sidebar" is 
>American magazine usage.  Generally a sidebar in this sense contains a 
>summary of the contents of the page or repeats an important point.

Ah, grey's easy, since these blocks are get most of their juice from the
frame mechanisms:
\setupcolors[state=start]
\setupfloat [intermezzo] 
   [leftmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    rightmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    default={outer,high},
    background=color,
    backgroundcolor=gray]

(High seems a little better for the aesthetics of the block placement.)

I figured out what I needed from the Details manual, so you were on the
right track, anyway.
-- 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
 Adam T. Lindsay, Computing Dept.     atl@comp.lancs.ac.uk
 Lancaster University, InfoLab21        +44(0)1524/510.514
 Lancaster, LA1 4WA, UK             Fax:+44(0)1524/510.492
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[John Culleton]

On Monday 27 December 2004 06:33, Adam Lindsay wrote:

> plus-rul is interesting, but I'm 98% certain that when John talks about
> sidebars, he means what you call intermezzos. My interpretation, using
> the things I do know (or figured out this morning):
>
> \setupfloat [intermezzo]
>    [leftmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
>     rightmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
>     default=outer]
> \setupcaption[intermezzo][location=none]
> \starttext
> \showframe
> \input ward
> \placeintermezzo{}{\framedtext[width=7cm]{\tfx\input dawkins }}
> \dorecurse{3}{\input knuth \par}
> \stoptext
>
> What I don't know, however, is: 1) how to force a width on flowed text
> within a float without resorting to the internal \framedtext, or 2) how
> to use this with \splitfloat, which is what I suspect people who think
> about sidebars (intermezzo texts) are going to be worried about in a
> batch-based system.

For my applications I don't need a lengthy sidebar that will overflow to 
another page.

I ran Adam's code as is and noted with interest the results. Then I added the 
gray background, rounded corners etc.  Some things are still problems.

1. Two words in the main text (both "influenced")  actually intrude into the 
sidebar. 

1a. One word in the sidebar ("influencing") overflows the dimensions of the 
background. (but see 3 below.)

2. If I specify a background screen and a frame with rounded corners the 
background remains rectangular and does not round to match the frame.

3. If I specify frame=overlay then the text of the sidebar no longer overflows 
the background but the sidebar text goes out to the very edge of the 
background.    Better to just add a hyphen to the single word. I may play 
with "offset=" or with the TeX \tolerance parameter. 

4. The sidebar in the original test example goes out almost to the very edge 
of the paper. Printers don't like this :-) I will play with page layout 
dimensions a bit to see if I can fix this. 

Here is my current version:

----------------------------
\setupfloat [intermezzo] 
   [leftmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    rightmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    default=outer]
\setupcaption[intermezzo][location=none]
\setupcolors[state=start]
\starttext
\showframe
\input ward
\placeintermezzo{}
{\framedtext[width=7cm,frame=on,framecorner=round,frameradius=6pt,
%framecolor=gray,
background=screen,backgroundscreen=.7]{\tfx\input dawkins }}
\dorecurse{3}{\input knuth \par}
\stoptext

--------------------------
-- 
John Culleton

Short list of publishing/marketing books:
http://wexfordpress.com/tex/shortlist.pdf

if I only had a frame (was: Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!)

[Adam Lindsay]

John Culleton said this at Mon, 27 Dec 2004 12:42:09 -0500:

>1. Two words in the main text (both "influenced")  actually intrude into the 
>sidebar. 
>
>1a. One word in the sidebar ("influencing") overflows the dimensions of the 
>background. (but see 3 below.)

I tried your example as sent, and I had no margin intrusions--are you
having hyphenation problems? Is cmr still your default font? (Or are you
perhaps using UK hyphenation rules?)

>2. If I specify a background screen and a frame with rounded corners the 
>background remains rectangular and does not round to match the frame.

I noticed that too. It seems a feature interaction with corner rounding--
I suspect they were never intended to go together. You'll probably need
to get into MetaPost for proper fancy bordering.

>4. The sidebar in the original test example goes out almost to the very edge 
>of the paper. Printers don't like this :-) I will play with page layout 
>dimensions a bit to see if I can fix this. 

Yeah, I just went with the default margins/layout and turned on the page
frames to more clearly/minimally illustrate the example. This *ought* to
work with any sane layout...

-- 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
 Adam T. Lindsay, Computing Dept.     atl@comp.lancs.ac.uk
 Lancaster University, InfoLab21        +44(0)1524/510.514
 Lancaster, LA1 4WA, UK             Fax:+44(0)1524/510.492
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Re: if I only had a frame

[Hans Hagen]

Adam Lindsay wrote:

>>2. If I specify a background screen and a frame with rounded corners the 
>>background remains rectangular and does not round to match the frame.
> 
> 
> I noticed that too. It seems a feature interaction with corner rounding--
> I suspect they were never intended to go together. You'll probably need
> to get into MetaPost for proper fancy bordering.

\starttext

\setupcolors[state=start]

\framed[corner=round,background=color,backgroundcolor=red]{HELLO}

\framed[corner=round,background=screen,backgroundscreen=.6]{HELLO}

\stoptext

this gives rounded corners here,

Hans

-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
      tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                              | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: if I only had a frame

[Hans Hagen]

Adam Lindsay wrote:

> Yeah, I just went with the default margins/layout and turned on the page
> frames to more clearly/minimally illustrate the example. This *ought* to
> work with any sane layout...

ne can always increase the tolerance

Hans

-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
      tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                              | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Hans Hagen]

John Culleton wrote:
> On Monday 27 December 2004 06:33, Adam Lindsay wrote:
> 
> 
>>plus-rul is interesting, but I'm 98% certain that when John talks about
>>sidebars, he means what you call intermezzos. My interpretation, using
>>the things I do know (or figured out this morning):
>>
>>\setupfloat [intermezzo]
>>   [leftmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
>>    rightmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
>>    default=outer]
>>\setupcaption[intermezzo][location=none]
>>\starttext
>>\showframe
>>\input ward
>>\placeintermezzo{}{\framedtext[width=7cm]{\tfx\input dawkins }}
>>\dorecurse{3}{\input knuth \par}
>>\stoptext
>>
>>What I don't know, however, is: 1) how to force a width on flowed text
>>within a float without resorting to the internal \framedtext, or 2) how
>>to use this with \splitfloat, which is what I suspect people who think
>>about sidebars (intermezzo texts) are going to be worried about in a
>>batch-based system.
> 
> 
> For my applications I don't need a lengthy sidebar that will overflow to 
> another page.
> 
> I ran Adam's code as is and noted with interest the results. Then I added the 
> gray background, rounded corners etc.  Some things are still problems.
> 
> 1. Two words in the main text (both "influenced")  actually intrude into the 
> sidebar. 
> 
> 1a. One word in the sidebar ("influencing") overflows the dimensions of the 
> background. (but see 3 below.)
> 
> 2. If I specify a background screen and a frame with rounded corners the 
> background remains rectangular and does not round to match the frame.

\starttext

\setupcolors[state=start]

\framed[corner=round,background=color,backgroundcolor=red]{HELLO}

\framed[corner=round,background=screen,backgroundscreen=.6]{HELLO}

\setupfloat
   [intermezzo]
   [leftmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    rightmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    default=outer]

\setupcaption[intermezzo][location=none]

\defineframedtext
   [myohmy]
   [width=7cm,bodyfont=small,corner=round,background=screen,backgroundscreen=.6]

\showframe
\input ward
\placeintermezzo{}{\startmyohmy \input dawkins \relax\stopmyohmy}
\dorecurse{3}{\input knuth \par}

\stoptext

-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
      tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                              | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: Re: if I only had a frame

[Adam Lindsay]

Hans Hagen said this at Mon, 27 Dec 2004 20:24:55 +0100:

>\framed[corner=round,background=color,backgroundcolor=red]{HELLO}

Thanks. I had never grappled with the corner option in \framed before:
 corner = framecorner + backgroundcorner

That actually makes sense. :)
-- 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
 Adam T. Lindsay, Computing Dept.     atl@comp.lancs.ac.uk
 Lancaster University, InfoLab21        +44(0)1524/510.514
 Lancaster, LA1 4WA, UK             Fax:+44(0)1524/510.492
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Re: Re: if I only had a frame

[Hans Hagen]

Adam Lindsay wrote:
> Hans Hagen said this at Mon, 27 Dec 2004 20:24:55 +0100:
> 
> 
>>\framed[corner=round,background=color,backgroundcolor=red]{HELLO}
> 
> 
> Thanks. I had never grappled with the corner option in \framed before:
>  corner = framecorner + backgroundcorner
> 
> That actually makes sense. :)

there was a time that i was rather glad that i could program such things and 
achieve  such effects ... of course it was long before i started playing with 
metapost; technically it is possible to hook all kind of things into frameds 
background handler

Hans


-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
      tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                              | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[John Culleton]

On Monday 27 December 2004 14:29, Hans Hagen wrote:

> \starttext
>
> \setupcolors[state=start]
>
> \framed[corner=round,background=color,backgroundcolor=red]{HELLO}
>
> \framed[corner=round,background=screen,backgroundscreen=.6]{HELLO}
>
> \setupfloat
>    [intermezzo]
>    [leftmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
>     rightmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
>     default=outer]
>
> \setupcaption[intermezzo][location=none]
>
> \defineframedtext
>    [myohmy]
>   
> [width=7cm,bodyfont=small,corner=round,background=screen,backgroundscreen=.
>6]
>
> \showframe
> \input ward
> \placeintermezzo{}{\startmyohmy \input dawkins \relax\stopmyohmy}
> \dorecurse{3}{\input knuth \par}
>
> \stoptext
>

AHA!

I fiddled a bit to correct justification, and to get rid of the frame. Forced 
hyphenation could have corrected things without so much tolerance.
-------------------------------------------------
\setupcolors[state=start]
\tolerance=1000
\frenchspacing
\starttext
\framed[corner=round,background=color,backgroundcolor=red]{HELLO}

\framed[corner=round,background=screen,backgroundscreen=.6]{HELLO}

\setupfloat
   [intermezzo]
   [leftmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    rightmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    default=outer,high]

\setupcaption[intermezzo][location=none]

\defineframedtext
   [myohmy]
   [width=7cm,bodyfont=small,
frame=off,
backgroundcorner=round, 
backgroundradius=16pt,background=screen,backgroundscreen=.7]

%\showframe
\input ward
\placeintermezzo{}{\startmyohmy \frenchspacing\tolerance=7000\input dawkins 
\relax\stopmyohmy}
\dorecurse{3}{\input knuth \par}

\stoptext
--------------------------------------

The only defect I can spot, and this is really a nit-pick, are the short lines 
in the main body text just above and just below the intermezzo/sidebar.

This is really very valuable. 

A low bow in the direction of my mentors, Hans and Adam.   
-- 
John Culleton

Short list of publishing/marketing books:
http://wexfordpress.com/tex/shortlist.pdf

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Adam Lindsay]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1147 bytes --]

John Culleton said this at Mon, 27 Dec 2004 15:29:10 -0500:

>\setupfloat
>   [intermezzo]
>   [leftmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
>    rightmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
>    default=outer,high]

>The only defect I can spot, and this is really a nit-pick, are the short
>lines 
>in the main body text just above and just below the intermezzo/sidebar.

Ah, that's the "aesthetics" I mentioned earlier: put the curly braces
around outer,high – that sends both values to the default:

\setupfloat
   [intermezzo]
   [leftmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    rightmargindistance=-\outercombitotal,
    default={outer,high}]

Delving further into details.pdf (I got this from a day of playing with
it--which is hardly adequate for really digesting one of Hans's manuals)
will probably yield even better results.
-- 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
 Adam T. Lindsay, Computing Dept.     atl@comp.lancs.ac.uk
 Lancaster University, InfoLab21        +44(0)1524/510.514
 Lancaster, LA1 4WA, UK             Fax:+44(0)1524/510.492
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

[-- Attachment #2: Type: text/plain, Size: 139 bytes --]

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Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Hans Hagen]

Adam Lindsay wrote:

> Delving further into details.pdf (I got this from a day of playing with
> it--which is hardly adequate for really digesting one of Hans's manuals)
> will probably yield even better results.

ok, i know they're sub optimal, but things like grids and graphics are 
troublesome anyway (we often get naive design specs like 'everything should go 
on the grid' and after that we enter some endless loop of 'do this and change 
that' simply because grids and graphic placement don't go well with other 
demands; normally in hand-tuned dtp a lot of cheating goes on which context has 
to kind of figure out itself; so ... what you see in details.pdf is actually a 
summary of our struggle with 'designers')

Hans


-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
      tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                              | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Adam Lindsay]

Hans Hagen said this at Mon, 27 Dec 2004 22:19:18 +0100:

>> Delving further into details.pdf (I got this from a day of playing with
>> it--which is hardly adequate for really digesting one of Hans's manuals)
>> will probably yield even better results.
>
>ok, i know they're sub optimal,

Not meant to be a critique! It's just that they're incredibly dense with
information that is easily missed on the first (or fourth) reading. The
good thing is that so much is in there...
-- 
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
 Adam T. Lindsay, Computing Dept.     atl@comp.lancs.ac.uk
 Lancaster University, InfoLab21        +44(0)1524/510.514
 Lancaster, LA1 4WA, UK             Fax:+44(0)1524/510.492
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Tobias Hilbricht]

Am So, den 26.12.2004 schrieb h h extern um 21:33:
> John Culleton wrote:
> 
> > But this is not the only type of versal. Sometimes a large capital letter 
> > (perhaps in italics) is centered on the top of the textblock thus:
> 
> Did you look into supp-fun.tex?

I was trying to use the macros provided by supp-fun.tex some month before,
but I could not get numbers instead of letters to work - see the little 
example below. How can I solve that problem?

Thanks for helpful hints in advance!

Yours sincerely

Tobias Hilbricht 

-----------------

\def\MyDroppedCaps%  
{\DroppedCaps
  {} {uplr8t}     
  {2\baselineskip} {3pt} {\baselineskip} {2}}

\language[de]
\starttext

\MyDroppedCaps H allo ich bin das H und bin am Anfang des Abschnitts sehr gro"s geraten. 
                                      Aber ich kann mich auch klein machen und sehe dann so aus: h!

\MyDroppedCaps 1 2 3 im Sauseschritt bringen wir die Liebe mit.

\stoptext


-----------------

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Hans Hagen]

Tobias Hilbricht wrote:
> Am So, den 26.12.2004 schrieb h h extern um 21:33:
> 
>>John Culleton wrote:
>>
>>
>>>But this is not the only type of versal. Sometimes a large capital letter 
>>>(perhaps in italics) is centered on the top of the textblock thus:
>>
>>Did you look into supp-fun.tex?
> 
> 
> I was trying to use the macros provided by supp-fun.tex some month before,
> but I could not get numbers instead of letters to work - see the little 
> example below. How can I solve that problem?

The magic is in:

\def\DroppedString{ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ}


Hans

-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
      tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                              | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Tobias Hilbricht]

Am Do, den 30.12.2004 schrieb Hans Hagen um 10:32:
> Tobias Hilbricht wrote:
> > Am So, den 26.12.2004 schrieb h h extern um 21:33:
> > 
> > I was trying to use the macros provided by supp-fun.tex some month before,
> > but I could not get numbers instead of letters to work - see the little 
> > example below. How can I solve that problem?
> 
> The magic is in:
> 
> \def\DroppedString{ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ}

Dear Hans,

thanks for your reply! I noticed \DroppedString in supp-fun.tex and
tried to include numbers there (to have it permanent) before I asked on
this list, but that did not work. Now after your reply I tried a 
definition of \DroppedString including numbers in the document preamble,
and then it works. Is it possible to perform the extended definition of
\DroppedString in supp-fun.tex directly? Just changing 

\def\DroppedString{ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ}

to

\def\DroppedString{ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ0123456789}

in supp-fun.tex does not work for me.

Thanks again

Yours sincerely

Tobias Hilbricht

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Hans Hagen]

Tobias Hilbricht wrote:

> \def\DroppedString{ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ0123456789}
> 
> in supp-fun.tex does not work for me.

Can you send me a minimal test file that fails

Hans


-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
      tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                              | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Tobias Hilbricht]

Am Mo, den 03.01.2005 schrieb Hans Hagen um 11:06:
> Tobias Hilbricht wrote:
> 
> > \def\DroppedString{ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ0123456789}
> > 
> > in supp-fun.tex does not work for me.
> 
> Can you send me a minimal test file that fails

In supp-fun.tex (version=1995.10.10) I have added in line 122 the numbers:

\def\DroppedString%
  {ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ0123456789}

The following example does not work for the numbers here (but for the 
letters it works):

%-----example----

\def\MyDroppedCaps%  
{\DroppedCaps
  {} {uplr8t}     
  {2\baselineskip} {3pt} {\baselineskip} {2}}

\language[de]
\starttext

\MyDroppedCaps H allo ich bin das H und bin am Anfang des Abschnittssehr gro"s geraten. Aber ich kann mich auch klein machen und sehe dannso aus: h!

\MyDroppedCaps 1 2 3 im Sauseschritt bringen wir die Liebe mit.

\stoptext

%--example----

However, adding 

\def\DroppedString%
  {ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ0123456789}

(i.e. the very same lines) to the document preamble 
of the example above works for numbers and letters as expected.

Yours sincerely

Tobias Hilbricht

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Hans Hagen]

Tobias Hilbricht wrote:

> However, adding 
> 
> \def\DroppedString%
>   {ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ0123456789}
> 
> (i.e. the very same lines) to the document preamble 
> of the example above works for numbers and letters as expected.

since supp-fun is part of the kernel, you need to regenerate a format after a 
change, so, adding the numbers in the document is ok; another option is:

\appended\def\DroppedString{0123456789}

in either your document, or in your local cont-sys.tex

Hans

-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
      tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                              | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: Sidebars and versals Oh my!

[Tobias Hilbricht]

Am Mo, den 03.01.2005 schrieb Hans Hagen um 13:32:

> since supp-fun is part of the kernel, you need to regenerate a format after a 
> change, so, adding the numbers in the document is ok; another option is:
> 
> \appended\def\DroppedString{0123456789}
> 
> in either your document, or in your local cont-sys.tex

Thank you for your help! I was not aware of the required format
regeneration - sorry for bothering you.

Yours sincerely

Tobias Hilbricht