[TUHS] TeX/troff/typesetting markups - Re: SunOS 4 documentation

[steffen@sdaoden.eu (Steffen Nurpmeso)]

Toby Thain <toby at telegraphics.com.au> wrote:
 |On 2017-04-13 9:41 AM, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:
 |> ...
 |> i have no idea of what happened on the TeX side in the last, say,
 |> about 15 years.  TeXLive has always been too large for me, i have
 |
 |They have a small "basic" version with the essentials, a hundred 
 |megabytes or so.
 |
 |http://www.tug.org/mactex/morepackages.html

Oh, ok, now MacTeX basic, 110 MB.  That is really much, much
better, for me, that is.  I never used TeX since then, so i cannot
really tell -- my KerTeX repo ball is 11 MB..

  ...
 |> My finding is that, with groff, i can produce papers (mostly
 |> letters) of almost identical beauty with some fine-tuning, with
 |> almost the identical number of "markup" (which is now also easily
 |> typed with the american keyboard).  And the fine-tuning i like,
 |> because i adore the calligraphic as an art, as an act of devotion
 |> of the calligrapher, to some higher spirit or the being as such,
 |> and spending some seconds in some text is my simple Boche
 |> equivalence to those fine spirits.
 |
 |Indeed, as a typographer, I believe details matter, no matter what the 
 |audience. I think Knuth feels the same way. :)

It is really perfectly looking.  Maybe too perfect, in the
sense of, maybe even aseptic.  At least when having handmade,
artistic calligraphy as a personal optimum.  But this is of course
strange for business letters, and doesn't excuse irregular holes
in between words all over the page, as can be seen in
non-optimized roff.

--steffen