Interesting interview

Interesting interview

[Thomas A. Schmitz]

Hi all,

thought this might be of interest to some of you: the tug website has  
just published an interview with Will Robertson ( http://www.tug.org/ 
interviews/interview-files/will-robertson.html ), whom some of you  
may know from his work on XeLaTeX. Will is the author of the fontspec  
package which offers lots of very advanced options for choosing and  
switching fonts in XeTeX. There was one passage that I found quite  
interesting:

> This leads me into a few words about where I think the big problems  
> of LaTeX lie. Because it's obvious that it is much harder to learn  
> than it could be. And the crux of the problem, the long and the  
> short of it, is that the LaTeX kernel has been intentionally  
> restricted to the functionality originally designed for it. Now,  
> this is a good thing, by and large. Standards need to be frozen in  
> order for them to be adhered to. But it's past time to move on and  
> create a new standard. There are fast approaching competitors that  
> will eventually overtake LaTeX if we continue to stagnate. (Not to  
> mention ConTeXt, which has surpassed LaTeX in essentially every  
> area. Maybe the solution is just for everyone to switch to that.)

I mean, we all know that this is true, but it's great that a fairly  
well-known member of the LaTeX crowd says so as well.

All best

Thomas

Re: Interesting interview

[Maurice Diamantini]

Le 12 avr. 07 à 07:37, Thomas A. Schmitz a écrit :

>> ... There are fast approaching competitors that
>> will eventually overtake LaTeX if we continue to stagnate. (Not to
>> mention ConTeXt, which has surpassed LaTeX in essentially every
>> area. Maybe the solution is just for everyone to switch to that.)

Except for reference documentation or book (no need for a "s" here!).
That's why I come back to LaTeX (but keep subscribe to this mailing
list ;-)

> I mean, we all know that this is true, but it's great that a fairly
> well-known member of the LaTeX crowd says so as well.

-- Maurice

Re: Interesting interview

[Aditya Mahajan]

On Fri, 13 Apr 2007, Maurice Diamantini wrote:

>
> Le 12 avr. 07 à 07:37, Thomas A. Schmitz a écrit :
>
>>> ... There are fast approaching competitors that
>>> will eventually overtake LaTeX if we continue to stagnate. (Not to
>>> mention ConTeXt, which has surpassed LaTeX in essentially every
>>> area. Maybe the solution is just for everyone to switch to that.)
>
> Except for reference documentation or book (no need for a "s" here!).

While starting ConTeXt, I found ConTeXt an excrusion and ConTeXt 
manual to be extremely well written, much better than what I had read 
for LaTeX (but then, I never bought a LaTeX book). What do you find 
missing in the ConTeXt documentation that a book should cover? I know 
that there are certain places where the documentation is a bit old and 
outdated, but given the pace at which ConTeXt is developed, that will 
happen with any reference book.

Aditya

Re: Interesting interview

[Jelle Huisman]

Op 13-apr-2007, om 9:20 heeft Aditya Mahajan het volgende geschreven:

> While starting ConTeXt, I found ConTeXt an excrusion and ConTeXt
> manual to be extremely well written, much better than what I had read
> for LaTeX (but then, I never bought a LaTeX book). What do you find
> missing in the ConTeXt documentation that a book should cover?

In Epen we discussed 'the book' and a 'ConTeXt cookbook'. I think  
that this discussion shows that it would be good for the ConTeXt  
community to have a book published by a publisher (like AW), but  
someone (or a small committee) has to coordinate it.

Greetings,

Jelle

The ConTeXt Companion (was: Interesting interview)

[Ulf Martin]

Jelle Huisman schrieb:
> Op 13-apr-2007, om 9:20 heeft Aditya Mahajan het volgende geschreven:
> 
>> While starting ConTeXt, I found ConTeXt an excrusion and ConTeXt
>> manual to be extremely well written, much better than what I had read
>> for LaTeX (but then, I never bought a LaTeX book). What do you find
>> missing in the ConTeXt documentation that a book should cover?
> 
> In Epen we discussed 'the book' and a 'ConTeXt cookbook'. I think  
> that this discussion shows that it would be good for the ConTeXt  
> community to have a book published by a publisher (like AW), but  
> someone (or a small committee) has to coordinate it.

I agree! The documentation situation of ConTeXt is rather messy. Some
stuff on the wiki, many, many PDFs with cryptic names and some years old.

LaTeX since ages has "lshort" as the quick standard intro (and of course
numerous others) and then the mighty 1100+ pages tome Mittelbach et al.
"The LaTeX Companion" where most things can be found that even the
anvanced user might need (recently it appeared in a second edition, thus
probably securing LaTeXs leading position for another decade...).
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0201362996

Now, if we had "The ConTeXt Companion" ;-)

Cheers
Ulf

Re: The ConTeXt Companion

[Patrick Gundlach]

[...]

> Now, if we had "The ConTeXt Companion" ...

... ConTeXt would probably stabilize, which IMHO is not a good thing.
One thing I really love ConTeXt for is the speed new techniques are
adopted (pdf features, luatex,...) One day we might have a ConTeXt
MKII book for those who are afraid of swithing to pdftex2.

Patrick
-- 
ConTeXt wiki and more: http://contextgarden.net

Re: The ConTeXt Companion

[Ulf Martin]

Patrick Gundlach schrieb:
>> Now, if we had "The ConTeXt Companion" ...
> 
> ... ConTeXt would probably stabilize, which IMHO is not a good thing.
> One thing I really love ConTeXt for is the speed new techniques are
> adopted (pdf features, luatex,...) One day we might have a ConTeXt
> MKII book for those who are afraid of swithing to pdftex2.

I don't think that The ConTeXt Companion (TCC) would halt ConTeXt
development. The LaTeX Companion (TLC) didn't do that for LaTeX. Now,
TLC was in 1st edition from 1994 to 2004, meaning that it was quite
outdated in the end (one reason for me, btw, to look around wether there
are other options to do teXing, and discovering ConTeXt). But it kept
the reference situation in a well defined three step state:
(1) look into one of the small LaTeX guides;
(2) look into TLC;
(3) look into package docs, internet etc. (which is, of course messy).
My experience is that one rarely needed to go past (2).

With ConTeXt there is, of course, the "excursion" (equiv. to (1)) and
the manual (2), but many important issues (the phantastic XML processing
capabilities, bibliography stuff, typography, font management,...) are
not quite complete or covered elsewhere (i.e. situation 3).

Ulf

Re: The ConTeXt Companion

[Andrea Valle]

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>
> With ConTeXt there is, of course, the "excursion" (equiv. to (1)) and
> the manual (2), but many important issues (the phantastic XML  
> processing
> capabilities, bibliography stuff, typography, font management,...) are
> not quite complete or covered elsewhere (i.e. situation 3).

I totally agree. There are of course documents about the last topics  
you mention (not to talk about the mailing list, of course),
  but they seems to need a more general introduction,  at least for  
me. I'd like to have a book
covering all the aspects so that you a conceptual frame which unifies  
the whole stuff. Then, you can procede by yourself in
a more organized way.

By the way, a similar issue has been raised about SuperCollider,  
which in my esperience is similar for documentation to ConTeXt.
Many deep documents, a huge work by the developers, some good intro/ 
tutorial, but no a complete book.
The situation has now evolved in a project about a SC book which has  
been submitted to MIT Press.

In any case, I cannot understand how people can go back to LaTeX, I  
mean from a user's perpsective. I'm a total ConTeXt ignorant but,  
just using setups, I've created A1 musical scores involving metapost  
and importing external files, A0 academic posters using layers so  
much better then powerpoint, an on-going book full of syntax  
colorized code...I just wouldn't started with LaTeX :-)


Best

-a-




> Ulf
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> ntg-context mailing list
> ntg-context@ntg.nl
> http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context

--------------------------------------------------
Andrea Valle
--------------------------------------------------
CIRMA - DAMS
Università degli Studi di Torino
--> http://www.cirma.unito.it/andrea/
--> andrea.valle@unito.it
--------------------------------------------------


I did this interview where I just mentioned that I read Foucault. Who  
doesn't in university, right? I was in this strip club giving this  
guy a lap dance and all he wanted to do was to discuss Foucault with  
me. Well, I can stand naked and do my little dance, or I can discuss  
Foucault, but not at the same time; too much information.
(Annabel Chong)





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Re: The ConTeXt Companion

[Hans Hagen]

Ulf Martin wrote:
> With ConTeXt there is, of course, the "excursion" (equiv. to (1)) and
> the manual (2), but many important issues (the phantastic XML processing
> capabilities, bibliography stuff, typography, font management,...) are
> not quite complete or covered elsewhere (i.e. situation 3).
>   
concerning xml ... i will update that manual once we have mkiv in place;  currently xml processing has some dark corners when tex and xml are used mixed but this will go away; i also have some experimental xml manipulation code laying around (filtering, replacing, etc). In this respect mkiv will be quite powerfull for xml

Hans 

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mirrored pages

[Horacio Suarez]

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Hello all:

Is there a way to obtain a mirrored pdf?

I don´t have a postscript printer. I been doing that in Acrobat using a 
plugin, but I´m trying to avoid Adobe Acrobat.

i´m using context 2007.02.21 11:55, running from SciTe, Ghostscript 8.56 and 
GSview 4.8

Thankyou very much.

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Re: mirrored pages

[Mari Voipio]

On Wed, 18 Apr 2007, Horacio Suarez wrote:
> Is there a way to obtain a mirrored pdf?

Mirrored in what way? (I use Acrobat when necessary, but I'm not familiar 
with the plug-ins, which is why I have to ask...)


Do you mean mirror margins, i.e. inside and outside margins instead of 
left and right? For double-sided printing? Are you doing your pdf from 
ConTeXt source or do you just want to rearrange an existing pdf for mirror 
margin layout?

Mirror margins can be done in ConTeXt code. This wiki page gives the first 
hint on margins: http://wiki.contextgarden.net/Layout
Note that you always layout the 'odd' page, i.e the right-hand page and 
then define a double-sided layout (nb. even though the command 
\showlayout will give you several pages of layout, it will *only* show 
the right-hand layout - look at the text itself to make sure you got the 
mirror margins right).


I frankly don't know if my solution is the most elegant one, but this 
works for me:

\setuplayout
      [footer=1cm,
      backspace=5.5cm, %inside margin
      width=12cm] %textwidth, leaves 3.5cm for outside margin on A4

\setuppagenumbering
 	[alternative=doublesided, %this is where doublesided comes in
 	location={header,margin}] %pagenumber location

If you use the above page number location, the page number is placed just 
outside of outer margin in the header and you can see very easily if 
mirroring is in place.


I'm not sure if rearranging existing pdf works A4->A4, but if you need to 
do a book layout or leaflet or something similar, "imposition" is the term 
you want and pdfarrange can be the answer, see 
http://wiki.contextgarden.net/Imposition for more information and tips.



The other meaning for 'mirrored':
Do you, for some reason, really want to mirror a page like a mirror 
would reflect it, i.e. text backwards etc? Like for printing on t-shirt 
transfer?

I don't know if this can be done... I'd assume ConTeXt or texexec knows 
how to do it, I just haven't needed to find out (yet). :-)



Hope this helps,

Mari
(who found out about mirrored margins with the trial-and-error method 
before the wiki existed...)

Re: mirrored pages

[luigi scarso]

> I frankly don't know if my solution is the most elegant one, but this
> works for me:
Given that you are elegant , then your solutions will be elegants . :)

> Mari
> (who found out about mirrored margins with the trial-and-error method
> before the wiki existed...)

luigi
(who believe that egrep will save the world...)

Re: mirrored pages

[Hans Hagen]

Horacio Suarez wrote:
> Hello all:
>
> Is there a way to obtain a mirrored pdf?
>
> I don�t have a postscript printer. I been doing that in Acrobat using 
> a plugin, but I�m trying to avoid Adobe Acrobat.
>
> i�m using context 2007.02.21 11:55, running from SciTe, Ghostscript 
> 8.56 and GSview 4.8
what do you mean with mirrored? 

Hans 

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                                          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
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Re: mirrored pages

[Horacio Suarez]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1549 bytes --]

I´ve made a mistake and replyed to Mari Voipio. Sorry, Mari.

I need to print in a laser printer mirrored. The page should as is viewed in 
a mirror. All the pages. Fliped horizontally.

Thankyou very much.


>From: Hans Hagen <pragma@wxs.nl>
>Reply-To: mailing list for ConTeXt users <ntg-context@ntg.nl>
>To: mailing list for ConTeXt users <ntg-context@ntg.nl>
>Subject: Re: [NTG-context] mirrored pages
>Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2007 11:24:35 +0200
>
>Horacio Suarez wrote:
> > Hello all:
> >
> > Is there a way to obtain a mirrored pdf?
> >
> > I don�t have a postscript printer. I been doing that in Acrobat using
> > a plugin, but I�m trying to avoid Adobe Acrobat.
> >
> > i�m using context 2007.02.21 11:55, running from SciTe, Ghostscript
> > 8.56 and GSview 4.8
>what do you mean with mirrored?
>
>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
>-----------------------------------------------------------------
>
>_______________________________________________
>ntg-context mailing list
>ntg-context@ntg.nl
>http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context

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Re: mirrored pages

[Wolfgang Schuster]

On Thu, 19 Apr 2007 17:39:57 +0000
"Horacio Suarez" <horaciosuarez@hotmail.com> wrote:

> I´ve made a mistake and replyed to Mari Voipio. Sorry, Mari.
> 
> I need to print in a laser printer mirrored. The page should as is viewed in 
> a mirror. All the pages. Fliped horizontally.
> 
> Thankyou very much.
> 

Hi Horacio,

the following code should work.


\unprotect

\def\c!mirrored{mirrored}

\def\docopypages[#1][#2]%
  {\bgroup
   \getfiguredimensions[#1]%
   \getparameters[\??ip]
     [\c!n=\noffigurepages,
      \c!marking=\v!off,
      \c!scale=\!!thousand,
      \c!offset=\!!zeropoint,
      \c!mirrored=\v!no,
      #2]%
   \dorecurse\@@ipn
     {\doif\@@ipmirrored\v!yes\domirrorbox
      \vbox to \textheight
        {\hsize\textwidth
         \scratchdimen\@@ipoffset
         \centeredbox
           {\doifelse\@@ipmarking\v!on\cuthbox\hbox
              {\ifdim\scratchdimen>\zeropoint\relax
                 \advance\vsize -2\scratchdimen
                 \advance\hsize -2\scratchdimen
                 \externalfigure[#1][\c!page=\recurselevel,#2,\c!scale=,
\c!factor=\v!max,\c!offset=\v!overlay]% \else
                 \externalfigure[#1][\c!page=\recurselevel,#2,\c!offset=
\v!overlay]% \fi}}}
      \page}
   \egroup}

\protect

\setuppapersize[A4][A4]
\setuplayout[page]
\starttext
\copypages[file.pdf][mirrored=yes]
\stoptext


Gruß

Wolfgang

Re: mirrored pages

[Horacio Suarez]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 2061 bytes --]

Thankyou very much!!


>From: Wolfgang Schuster <schuster.wolfgang@googlemail.com>
>Reply-To: mailing list for ConTeXt users <ntg-context@ntg.nl>
>To: ntg-context@ntg.nl
>Subject: Re: [NTG-context] mirrored pages
>Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2007 20:40:20 +0200
>
>On Thu, 19 Apr 2007 17:39:57 +0000
>"Horacio Suarez" <horaciosuarez@hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I´ve made a mistake and replyed to Mari Voipio. Sorry, Mari.
> >
> > I need to print in a laser printer mirrored. The page should as is 
>viewed in
> > a mirror. All the pages. Fliped horizontally.
> >
> > Thankyou very much.
> >
>
>Hi Horacio,
>
>the following code should work.
>
>
>\unprotect
>
>\def\c!mirrored{mirrored}
>
>\def\docopypages[#1][#2]%
>   {\bgroup
>    \getfiguredimensions[#1]%
>    \getparameters[\??ip]
>      [\c!n=\noffigurepages,
>       \c!marking=\v!off,
>       \c!scale=\!!thousand,
>       \c!offset=\!!zeropoint,
>       \c!mirrored=\v!no,
>       #2]%
>    \dorecurse\@@ipn
>      {\doif\@@ipmirrored\v!yes\domirrorbox
>       \vbox to \textheight
>         {\hsize\textwidth
>          \scratchdimen\@@ipoffset
>          \centeredbox
>            {\doifelse\@@ipmarking\v!on\cuthbox\hbox
>               {\ifdim\scratchdimen>\zeropoint\relax
>                  \advance\vsize -2\scratchdimen
>                  \advance\hsize -2\scratchdimen
>                  \externalfigure[#1][\c!page=\recurselevel,#2,\c!scale=,
>\c!factor=\v!max,\c!offset=\v!overlay]% \else
>                  \externalfigure[#1][\c!page=\recurselevel,#2,\c!offset=
>\v!overlay]% \fi}}}
>       \page}
>    \egroup}
>
>\protect
>
>\setuppapersize[A4][A4]
>\setuplayout[page]
>\starttext
>\copypages[file.pdf][mirrored=yes]
>\stoptext
>
>
>Gruß
>
>Wolfgang
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Re: mirrored pages

[Hans Hagen]

Horacio Suarez wrote:
> I�ve made a mistake and replyed to Mari Voipio. Sorry, Mari.
>
> I need to print in a laser printer mirrored. The page should as is 
> viewed in a mirror. All the pages. Fliped horizontally.
\setuppapersize[A4][A4,mirrored]

\starttext

\dorecurse{10}{\input tufte \relax}

\stoptext

>
> Thankyou very much.
>
>
>> From: Hans Hagen <pragma@wxs.nl>
>> Reply-To: mailing list for ConTeXt users <ntg-context@ntg.nl>
>> To: mailing list for ConTeXt users <ntg-context@ntg.nl>
>> Subject: Re: [NTG-context] mirrored pages
>> Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2007 11:24:35 +0200
>>
>> Horacio Suarez wrote:
>> > Hello all:
>> >
>> > Is there a way to obtain a mirrored pdf?
>> >
>> > I don�t have a postscript printer. I been doing that in Acrobat using
>> > a plugin, but I�m trying to avoid Adobe Acrobat.
>> >
>> > i�m using context 2007.02.21 11:55, running from SciTe, Ghostscript
>> > 8.56 and GSview 4.8
>> what do you mean with mirrored?
>>
>> 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
>> -----------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> ntg-context mailing list
>> ntg-context@ntg.nl
>> http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
>
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                                             | www.pragma-pod.nl
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Re: mirrored pages

[Horacio Suarez]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 3141 bytes --]

Incredible. Thankyou very much.

I cant believe I didn´t see that.

>From: Hans Hagen <pragma@wxs.nl>
>Reply-To: mailing list for ConTeXt users <ntg-context@ntg.nl>
>To: mailing list for ConTeXt users <ntg-context@ntg.nl>
>Subject: Re: [NTG-context] mirrored pages
>Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2007 22:27:27 +0200
>
>Horacio Suarez wrote:
> > I�ve made a mistake and replyed to Mari Voipio. Sorry, Mari.
> >
> > I need to print in a laser printer mirrored. The page should as is
> > viewed in a mirror. All the pages. Fliped horizontally.
>\setuppapersize[A4][A4,mirrored]
>
>\starttext
>
>\dorecurse{10}{\input tufte \relax}
>
>\stoptext
>
> >
> > Thankyou very much.
> >
> >
> >> From: Hans Hagen <pragma@wxs.nl>
> >> Reply-To: mailing list for ConTeXt users <ntg-context@ntg.nl>
> >> To: mailing list for ConTeXt users <ntg-context@ntg.nl>
> >> Subject: Re: [NTG-context] mirrored pages
> >> Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2007 11:24:35 +0200
> >>
> >> Horacio Suarez wrote:
> >> > Hello all:
> >> >
> >> > Is there a way to obtain a mirrored pdf?
> >> >
> >> > I don�t have a postscript printer. I been doing that in Acrobat 
>using
> >> > a plugin, but I�m trying to avoid Adobe Acrobat.
> >> >
> >> > i�m using context 2007.02.21 11:55, running from SciTe, Ghostscript
> >> > 8.56 and GSview 4.8
> >> what do you mean with mirrored?
> >>
> >> 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
> >> -----------------------------------------------------------------
> >>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> ntg-context mailing list
> >> ntg-context@ntg.nl
> >> http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
> >
> > _________________________________________________________________
> > Don't just search. Find. Check out the new MSN Search!
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> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
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> > ntg-context@ntg.nl
> > http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
> >
>
>
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>
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>               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
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Re: The ConTeXt Companion

[Idris Samawi Hamid]

On Sat, 14 Apr 2007 02:58:11 -0600, Patrick Gundlach <patrick@gundla.ch>  
wrote:

> ... ConTeXt would probably stabilize, which IMHO is not a good thing.
> One thing I really love ConTeXt for is the speed new techniques are
> adopted (pdf features, luatex,...) One day we might have a ConTeXt
> MKII book for those who are afraid of swithing to pdftex2.

Hmm, we had this discussion in Epen...

I think that enough of the high-level interface is stable enough that a  
thorough ConTeXt book will be useful, particularly after luaTeX/pdfTeX2. I  
recall a particular someone at Epen volunteering to set up a working  
committee on this, even to write the book himself if no one volunteers to  
help soon...
:D :D :D

As for MKII/pdfTeX1, it makes no sense making a book for a stalled branch;  
pdfTeX1 will go the way of the original TeX engine. Who today will write a  
book for those who only want to use the dvi format?

Best
Idris

-- 
Professor Idris Samawi Hamid
Department of Philosophy
Colorado State University
Fort Collins, CO 80523

--
Using Opera's revolutionary e-mail client: http://www.opera.com/mail/

Re: The ConTeXt Companion

[Hans Hagen]

Idris Samawi Hamid wrote:
> On Sat, 14 Apr 2007 02:58:11 -0600, Patrick Gundlach <patrick@gundla.ch>  
> wrote:
>
>   
>> ... ConTeXt would probably stabilize, which IMHO is not a good thing.
>> One thing I really love ConTeXt for is the speed new techniques are
>> adopted (pdf features, luatex,...) One day we might have a ConTeXt
>> MKII book for those who are afraid of swithing to pdftex2.
>>     
>
> Hmm, we had this discussion in Epen...
>
> I think that enough of the high-level interface is stable enough that a  
> thorough ConTeXt book will be useful, particularly after luaTeX/pdfTeX2. I  
> recall a particular someone at Epen volunteering to set up a working  
> committee on this, even to write the book himself if no one volunteers to  
> help soon...
> :D :D :D
>
> As for MKII/pdfTeX1, it makes no sense making a book for a stalled branch;  
> pdfTeX1 will go the way of the original TeX engine. Who today will write a  
> book for those who only want to use the dvi format?
>   
hey, it's not that bad ...

functionality will not change but mkiv

- will have less to no input encoding and font encoding mess to be explained
- font installation wil be easier due to lack of encodings
- some functionality will be more robust due to node postprocessing 
(hidden for user)
- some new stuff (for idris -)

So ... apart from some chapters, much mkii/mkiv descriptions are the same

Hans

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Re: The ConTeXt Companion

[luigi scarso]

> > book for those who only want to use the dvi format?
> >
> hey, it's not that bad ...
After all it's DeVice Independent.
Maybe today it sounds better if we say 'output format independant'

Re: The ConTeXt Companion

[Martin Schröder]

2007/4/14, Idris Samawi Hamid <ishamid@colostate.edu>:
> As for MKII/pdfTeX1, it makes no sense making a book for a stalled branch;

debian users will continue to use pdfTeX1 for at least 10 years, I fear. :-)

Best
   Martin
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Re: The ConTeXt Companion

[Johannes Graumann]

Stable users that is.

Joh (on unstable, which even has a packaged LuaTeX snapshot - thanks guys!)

Martin Schröder wrote:

> 2007/4/14, Idris Samawi Hamid <ishamid@colostate.edu>:
>> As for MKII/pdfTeX1, it makes no sense making a book for a stalled
>> branch;
> 
> debian users will continue to use pdfTeX1 for at least 10 years, I fear.
> :-)
> 
> Best
>    Martin
>
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>
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Re: Interesting interview

[luigi scarso]

> Except for reference documentation or book (no need for a "s" here!).
This is exactly why I'm doing modules

> That's why I come back to LaTeX
Very sad about that.
I would like www.ensta.fr/~diam/latex/pst-uml/
in context some day.

luigi