Re: new debian context 2006.12.21-0.1

[Sanjoy Mahajan <sanjoy@mrao.cam.ac.uk>]

Here is Aditya's writeup with a few edits by this Mahajan.  The part
that might have been unclear to someone reading it for the first time
is how ConTeXt can be modular yet monolithic:

  It was designed with the same general-purpose aims as LaTeX, but
  being younger reflects much more recent thinking about the structure
  of the markup, is more modular in its conception, and more
  monolithic in its building.

So I shortened that bit in the version below.  Plus I added a bit
about color and hyperlinks, and I slightly softened the package clash
statement about LaTeX -- as Aditya says, LaTeX is orders of magnitude
better than a word processor, so let's be generous toward an ally in
the cause.

-Sanjoy


ConTeXt is a document-production system based on the TeX typesetting
system.  It was designed with the same aims as LaTeX but, being newer,
reflects more recent thinking about document markup and is more
unified in its design.  It includes extensive support for colors,
hyperlinks, presentations, figure-text integration, and conditional
compilation.  ConTeXt gives extensive formatting control to the end
user and makes it easy to create new layouts and styles without
learning the TeX macro language.  ConTeXt's unified design averts the
package clashes that can happen with LaTeX.

ConTeXt also integrates MetaFun, a superset of MetaPost and a powerful
system for vector graphics.  MetaFun can be used as a stand-alone
system to produce figures, but its strength lies in enhancing ConTeXt
documents with accurate graphic elements.

ConTeXt allows the users to use formatting commands in English, Dutch,
German, French, or Italian, and to use different typesetting engines
(PDFTeX, XeTeX, Aleph, and soon LuaTeX) without changing the user
interface.  ConText is developed rapidly, has a friendly user
community, and illustrates the free-software philosophy of "release
often", sometimes twice a day!