Re: bug? gap appears in columnset

[Lars Huttar <lars_huttar@sil.org>]

Hans wrote,
> Columnsets are rather special and mostly meant for magazine like 
> documents, where content can span columns, images are explicitly placed 
> on the grid, etc. For that reason columnset soperate on a rather strict 
> grid that gets setup based in the lineheight and although content can be 
> larger, the grid dictates what happens. Balancing is semi automatic and 
> nearly always demands some tweaks.

In our use of columnsets, we do have content that can span columns (but
we keep it outside of columnsets). We also have images within columns
that are placed in the flow of text via hangarounds. We manually tweak
our column lengths on each page (e.g.
\setupcolumnsetlines[columnset10][1][1][42]), in order to avoid the
worst of the widows and orphans. As you say, balancing requires manual
tweaks too, but it's not that big a burden, since we're already doing
\setupcolumnsetlines for many pages.

> Using columnsets for a large document that has to flow automatically is 
> therefore debatable. Regular multi columns or in mkiv mixed-columns are 
> a better choice then.

We have tried to port our code to mkiv, but have so far found been
unsuccessful. (But are trying again now, having found new success with
TL2013 mkii.)
Also, we've been unable to find any statement that mkiv is out of beta
status. Moreover, much of the documentation still seems to be oriented
toward mkii. So it's hard to justify much of a time investment in
porting production work to mkiv yet. Can you comment on the official
status of mkiv?

Regarding mixed-columns: I understand it's a rewrite of the old
"columns" model. My impression is that "columns" didn't support manual
tweaking of column lengths (like \setupcolumnsetlines). Does
mixed-columns support such a thing? That would be a critical question
for us, as it wouldn't be an option for us to spend time porting to mkiv
and using mixed-columns, if it doesn't allow us to tweak the height of
each column on each page.

Thanks again for your help and advice.
Lars

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