TeXhax Digest Wednesday, April 5, 1989 Volume 89 : Issue 33 Moderators: Tiina Modisett and Pierre MacKay %% The TeXhax digest is brought to you as a service of the TeX Users Group %%% %% in cooperation with the UnixTeX distribution service at the %%% %% University of Washington %%% Today's Topics: Announcing DVItoLN03 V3.0 VMS Systems --- Spell checking and Language-sensitive Editing Re: Text Processing for the 1990s Needed: "WEB for C" RE: Spidery WEB MakeIndex for the Macintosh Texhax 21, note from Munson re Adobe Illustrator Re: My posting in TeXhax 21 re: Adobe Illustrator Re: Nested conditionals ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Date: Tue, 4 APR 89 19:22:48 BST From: TEX%rmcs.cranfield.ac.uk@NSS.Cs.Ucl.AC.UK Subject: Announcing DVItoLN03 V3.0 Keywords: dviware Back in 1986, I developed my own DVI driver for the DEC LN03 printer, and it has been in use here at the RMCS ever since. About a year ago I released it to the UK TeX community, and I know that it is becoming quite widely used. Ted Nieland, who maintains the DECUS TeX collection, also had a copy of an earlier version towards the end of last year, but he is unable to provide an FTP service for it. The time has come, I think, for it to be released upon an unsuspecting Stateside public, so this is to announce the availability of the latest release, and a plea for any site over that that is prepared to provide access to it for anonymous FTP to get in touch --- the whole lot, including WEB sources and a userguide (which has also been fully processed so that it can just be copied to an LN03 to get installers started) occupies 1320 blocks; I would however, send it as a VMS_SHARE set, to avoid mailer congestion. Do I have any takers? I attach herewith part of the AAAREADME.TXT file describing DVItoLN03 V3.0 DVItoLN03 Version 3.0 21st March 1989 ========= =========== =============== This directory contains the following files: AAAREADME.TXT - the file you are reading DVILN03.HLP - on-line (DCL) help for DVItoLN03 *DVILN03.LN3 - file ready to be COPYed to your LN03 *DVILN03.TEX - the RMCS ``local guide'' for DVItoLN03 DVITOLN03.CH - a change file for DVItoLN03, currently empty! DVITOLN03.CLD - VMS command language definition for the DVIL command DVITOLN03.WEB - the WEB source of DVItoLN03 LOCAL.MF - our local parameters for METAFONTing for LN03 *LOCAL_GUIDES.BIB - a BibTeX database used by RMCS --- needs BibTeX V0.99c *GRAPHICS.STY - a local LaTeX style file for graphics inserts *OPENCLOSE.SIX - a Sixel dump of the screen of a terminal, scaled 2:1 *OPENCLOSE.SMALL - the same dump, but scaled 1:1 All the starred files are only concerned with producing the local guide, and may need local modification. DVILN03.HLP is a standard (DCL) help file, for inclusion in SYS$HELP:HELPLIB.HLB or your local specialized help library. LOCAL.MF contains the parameters for METAFONT suited to the Ricoh 4080 engine (used by the LN03). These values were taken from Vol8 #3 of TUGboat. You may find this useful if you need to generate the fonts from scratch. You may care to produce a copy of our local guide by simply COPYing the file DVILN03.LN3 to YOUR LN03. Please note that this file includes LOTS of eight- bit characters, so you may need to fetch it again in binary mode if your JANET connection has stripped off the 8th bit. If your LN03 is set up as a printer queue (as the local guide recommends), the safest bet is to PRINT it /PASSALL until you've found out how to set up the queue; one important caveat is that the terminal line MUST be set up /NOWRAP (see the local guide). However, the real meat is in DVITOLN03.WEB; this is a WEB version of a DVI-to... driver for the DEC LN03/LN03-Plus laser printers. This program has now been revised to V3.0 and is capable or reading EITHER packed or expanded raster files (standard TeXware ones, not Rose's .FNT format variant thereof). Packed (.nnnPK) files are used in preference to .PXL files, and are sought in directory given by the /PK_FONT_DIRECTORY qualifier; the .CLD file provided specifies this as TEX$PK:. PXL files are sought in the directory given by the /PXL_FONT_DIRECTORY qualifier, and, at RMCS, are kept in separate subdirectories of TEX$PXL_ROOT:, which is a concealed device and specified as the value for this qualifier. Details are given in the user guide, including rearranging the allocation of font files to different directory structures. This implementation of DVItoLN03 has the following advantages over certain other DVItoLN03 programs: i) It IS written in WEB, as opposed to C and other such kludgy languages ii) It downloads to the LN03's font memory the rasters for only those characters actually used in the document. As such, it does not run out of font memory just because you've used a few characters from each of a large number of different fonts iii) It HAS a capacity for SIMPLE graphics inclusions. These have to be in a format the LN03 understands (DEC sixels), and are copied verbatim into the output file generated. iv) It works with landscape and portrait orientations v) It makes use of the ``proper'' VAX/VMS DCL interface for commands vi) It CAN print glyphs whose rasters are too large to be downloaded to the LN03 in a font file (by performing a sixel graphics dump of the bitmap); obviously this slows things down considerably! vii) It CAN handle the invisible fonts used by SliTeX; each such character is actually downloaded as a one-row high glyph of white pixels (of the appropriate width) viii) The packed and unpacked font files may be provided in either a flat or a rooted directory structure; if logical names are used to specify these locations (as in the .CLD file provided), the files may be spread over a number of different directories or volumes. ix) The error messages are improved over earlier versions of the program, and are now all indexed in the woven (WEAVEd?) WEB. x) The program can now handle fonts with more then 128 characters, up to TeX's limit of 256. Therefore, it can now process documents which use Silvio Levy's Greek fonts. xi) Retention of the log (.TYP) file may now be forced, suppressed, or allowed to be determined by the success of the processing. xii) Minor revisions and corrections have been made, in particular, it now correctly understands the physical limitations to the imaging area. The program makes a number of assumptions: i) The .TFM files will be found in the directory to which the VMS logical name TEX$FONTS points; just where TeX expects to find them! ii) The LN03 has sufficient font memory --- for most meaningful documents you will need at least one RAM cartidge (part number LN03X-CR); the program WILL work with just the RAM in the basic printer, but you will probably have to restrict yourself to printing documents 3--4 pages at a time: very messy! Everything else is explained, I hope, in the local guide. As supplied, DVILN03.TEX does not utilize any of the special facilities provided by DVItoLN03, so it may be LaTeX'ed and DVI...'ed by any existing driver. After you've read the guide, and configured your system to support DVItoLN03, a full version of the guide may be printed by changing the first line of DVILN03.TEX to read: \let\iffulldoc=\iftrue %%% Change to \iftrue when DVItoLN03 is working instead of: \let\iffulldoc=\iffalse %%% Change to \iftrue when DVItoLN03 is working Before doing so, you will need to move LOCAL_GUIDES.BIB and OPENCLOSE.* to a directory pointed to by the logical name TEX$BIB, or define the latter to point to the current directory. This should produce a version of the guide identical to that distributed in .LN3 form, except that it will not include RMCS's shield on the title page. For those without any existing driver, the .LN3 file of OUR guide is also included; details above. The guide may be edited to suit YOUR site; I have attempted to flag all site-specific details in DVILN03.TEX with the string SYSDEP, on, or near to, the relevant line(s). Known deficiencies: None (I hope). Possible future work: Suggestions??? Brian HAMILTON KELLY | JANET: tex@uk.ac.cranfield.rmcs | | BITNET: tex%uk.ac.cranfield.rmcs@ac.uk | | INTERNET: tex%uk.ac.cranfield.rmcs@nss.cs.ucl.ac.uk | | Smail: School of Electrical Engineering & Science, Royal Military | | College of Science, Shrivenham, SWINDON SN6 8LA, U.K. | | Phone: Swindon (0793) 785252 (UK), +44-793-785252 (International) | P.S. BITNET Users: Please note that our site has had difficulty in receiving mail directly from the UK BITNET gateway. If you suspect that your messages aren't getting through, you could try: tex%rmcs%uk.ac.cranfield.cdvc@ac.uk -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 5 APR 89 14:37:21 BST From: TEX%rmcs.cranfield.ac.uk@NSS.Cs.Ucl.AC.UK Subject: VMS Systems --- Spell checking and Language-sensitive Editing Keywords: VMS, spell checker In TeXhax V89 #21 (dated 17th March, but only today, 5th April, received in UK), Sankara Rao requests: i) A spell checker for VMS. I have already replied off-line to two other enquirers regarding this, and have seen other enquiries/replies in TeXhax. We make extensive use of a SPELL program available from the DECUS collection. This understands (from the filetype) that it should ignore (La)TeX commands. It can do a similar job with DSR (runoff) and Scribe sources. The only problem is that is doesn't seem to understand plurals, so one is for ever adding them to the dictionary. ii) A .TPU ``program'' which understands LaTeX or TeX. Since he's from an educational institute, I presume it would not cost him an arm and a leg to buy DEC's LSE (Language-Sensitive Editor). There is availabale through AMS an LSE template for LaTeX for use with this LSE, but we here at RMCS have developed this so far away from the original that we have almost reached the stage of being able to say that it's all original work, and therefore would be prepared (soon --- watch this space) to put our version into the public domain. My colleague Niel Kempson has already put into the PD an LSE template for use with BibTeX which certainly simplifies the creation of .BIB files. Will let you all know when the PD version of the LaTeX LSE templates are ready... Brian HAMILTON KELLY | JANET: tex@uk.ac.cranfield.rmcs | | BITNET: tex%uk.ac.cranfield.rmcs@ac.uk | | INTERNET: tex%uk.ac.cranfield.rmcs@nss.cs.ucl.ac.uk | | Smail: School of Electrical Engineering & Science, Royal Military | | College of Science, Shrivenham, SWINDON SN6 8LA, U.K. | | Phone: Swindon (0793) 785252 (UK), +44-793-785252 (International) | P.S. BITNET Users: Please note that our site has had difficulty in receiving mail directly from the UK BITNET gateway. If you suspect that your messages aren't getting through, you could try: tex%rmcs%uk.ac.cranfield.cdvc@ac.uk ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 5 Apr 89 02:35 +1000 From: Douglas Miller Subject: Re: Text Processing for the 1990s Keywords: TeX Paul Davis writes of some "fundamental difficulties" with TeX: > TeX deals in empty rectangular boxes ... and knows nothing of their contents. > This has important consequences for the inclusion of figures, and doing many > of the tricks currently handled with ease by Mac-based DTP systems. What are these consequences and tricks (and why can only Mac-based systems perform them)? > No optimisation of pagination. None?! I assume you mean lack of global optimisation as happens with paragraphs. Do you (or other readers) have information or opinions about the improvement in pagination performance that could result from this? > The confused and confusing notion of one language being used for macro > definition (as in text replacement), and for building style files. The best place for macro definitions is IN the LaTeX style file, not the document. You are talking about LaTeX here are you? Everywhere else you mention only TeX ... confused and confusing indeed. > Im my opinion, only a complete rewrite of TeX, that takes its algorithms > ..., and moves on towards assimilating the lessons Don Knuth might have > learnt had DTP been in existence when he began work on TeX, will meet the > requirements of the 1990's. No, in his wisdom Don Knuth could FORSEE the lesson to be learned from "DTP" --- avoid at all costs! "DTP" --- never before has such a wrong-headed productivity decreasing idea been over-sold so much to a gullible computer public. The new creed of WYSIWYG is now worshipped by an army of devotees who uncritically submit to the forced labour of manual formatting. The few small voices of reason saying "What You See Is All You've Got", "structual writing" and "automated formatting" are lost beneath a sea of documents laboriously badly formatted by their authors and typeset poor or mediocre by their "DTP" software. What is next in this devolution of text processing, that started with the inappropriately named "Word Processing" and has now moved on to the ridiculously named "Desk Top Publishing"? I predict "Office Illuminated Manuscript". "OIM" will be based on a simplified version of the original MacPaint utility; in fact the only tool provided will be "fatbits". Think of the advantages: "easiest to learn system yet", "fully WYSIWYG", "total control of parchment layout to the pixel level". --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 5-APR-1989 15:21 GMT + 1:00 From: "Walter Speth, Bonn " Subject: Needed: "WEB for C" Keywords: WB, C >From Issue 21(89) of TeXhax i understand, that there exists a WEB that produces C-Sources from Webster-Files (?WEB2C?). Using that program it should be possible to gererate METAFONT or TEX-sources to be compiled by a C-Compiler, right? If so, can anybody tell me, whether I can obtain that program from public domain/shareware via BITNET or even send a copy (.ARCed and/or UUEncoded would be fine)? I can only manage to access network nodes by mail or message, not interactively - so not by FTP -. Thanks for any kind of reply, Walter SPETH@DBNPIB5 P.S. 21(89) was the first issue of TeXhax I got to read, so I do not know anything discussed earlier on that topic... -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 5 APR 89 14:45:06 BST From: TEX%rmcs.cranfield.ac.uk@NSS.Cs.Ucl.AC.UK Subject: RE: Spidery WEB Keywords: WEB In TeXhax V89 #21, Norman Ramsey reports upon his Spidery WEB, which certainly sounds great! I note, however, that it's implemented for U**x systems --- does anyone out there fancy porting it onto an {\em operating system\/}? (Specifically, I'd like to use something like this for Ada [and Fortran, although I note Norman's caveat regarding lexis] on a VAX/VMS system.) Brian HAMILTON KELLY .-------------------------------------------------------------------------. | JANET: tex@uk.ac.cranfield.rmcs | | BITNET: tex%uk.ac.cranfield.rmcs@ac.uk | | INTERNET: tex%uk.ac.cranfield.rmcs@nss.cs.ucl.ac.uk | | Smail: School of Electrical Engineering & Science, Royal Military | | College of Science, Shrivenham, SWINDON SN6 8LA, U.K. | | Phone: Swindon (0793) 785252 (UK), +44-793-785252 (International) | `-------------------------------------------------------------------------' P.S. BITNET Users: Please note that our site has had difficulty in receiving mail directly from the UK BITNET gateway. If you suspect that your messages aren't getting through, you could try: tex%rmcs%uk.ac.cranfield.cdvc@ac.uk P.P.S. To quote Phil Taylor, ``I hate Wimps and Eunuchs''. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 5 Apr 89 06:59:13 PDT From: MINER%UTA.MFENET@CCC.MFECC.LLNL.GOV Subject: MakeIndex for the Macintosh Keywords: MakeTndex, Macintosh Has anyone ported MakeIndex to the Macintosh? Thanks, Buff Miner ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 5 Apr 89 15:18-0500 From: Subject: Texhax 21, note from Munson re Adobe Illustrator Keywords: Mac, Adobe Illustrator, TeXTures In TeXhax 21, Ethan Munson says (about Adobe Illustrator): (paragraph 3) >> IT IS NOT POSSIBLE to view the end result and >> manipulate the figure simultaneously. This is INCORRECT. The Adobe manual very clearly explains, and I use this feature all the time, how to open two windows on your screen, and have one window show the ``end result'', and have the other show the ``figure''. Furthermore, ANY changes made in the figure are AUTOMATICALLY (sorry for the caps, but I caught the disease!) and instantaneously (at least on a Mac II, for figures that aren't too complex) shown in the other window. Those people lucky enough to equip their MacII with two monitors can even put one window on each monitor---say the figure on a monochrome monitor, and the ``end result'' on a color monitor. I should note also (I don't think anyone has mentioned this recently) that TeXTures has a nice feature to incorporate Adobe output (and preview it also if you choose the right option when saving your Adobe file) into TeX output, using a \special{illustration AdobeFileName} macro. Oisin McGuinness Math Dept Fordham University Bronx NY 10458 bitnet%"mcguiness@fordmurh" ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 5 Apr 89 12:46:20 -0700 From: munson@renoir.Berkeley.EDU (Ethan V. Munson) Subject: Re: My posting in TeXhax 21 re: Adobe Illustrator Keywords: Adobe Illustrator Well, now I know why I don't want to do software reviews for a living. In my note that appeared in TeXhax V89 n21 I incorrectly stated that you can view the final output while editing an illustration in Adobe Illustrator '88. You can do so by using a separate window which views the document in preview mode. As each change is made to the paths and their parameters in the editing window, the preview window is updated. In general, this occurs quickly, though it can take a while for large figures. Thus, provided you have enough screen space, you can edit a figure and see its final form (lack of screen space can be compensated for by zooming). Preview windows do not scroll automatically when you scroll another window examining the object. I still think that it is important to warn potential users that Illustrator is not a direct manipulation drawing program. It is a very powerful drawing tool, but it has a certain quality of indirectness that can surprise a first-time user. Ethan Munson munson@renoir.Berkeley.EDU ...!ucbvax!renoir!munson -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 6 Apr 89 19:40 EDT From: "Jerry Leichter (LEICHTER-JERRY@CS.YALE.EDU)" Subject: Re: Nested conditionals Keywords: nested conditionals Stephan v. Bechtolsheim wants to use a macro which might evaluate to either \iftrue or \iffalse. But this fails if the macro is nested inside another conditional which is false, since then TeX gets the nesting wrong. First off, there is no such thing in TeX as "evaluation". The word Mr. Bech- tolsheim wants to use is "expansion". The distinction is important, since what is involved here is exactly the order in which TeX does things, and exactly WHAT it does in various situations. TeX "evaluates", in some vague sense, the stuff being skipped due to a failed condition; but it doesn't *expand* it. There is a very good reason for this: Expansion can have side-effects. For example, expanding a \input command causes a new input file to be opened. It would be rather surprising if: \iffalse \input foo \fi were to open file foo! A discussion of what is expanded and when appears in the TeX book on pages 212ff; conditionals, in particular, are detailed at the top of 213. What drives TeX's matching of conditionals is the MEANING of tokens, not (directly) what they EXPAND to. The MEANING of a macro is "a macro which expands as follows...." This has no significance to the conditional matcher. The only things that DO have significance are the initial meanings of the the various \ifxxx's, \else, \or and \fi. \let can assign one of these meanings to some new control word; \def cannot. Mr. Bechtolsheim is in good company: The exact problem which he is running into trapped Don Knuth as well! It is discussed at the top of page 211 of the TeXbook, and it was exactly because what Mr. Bechtolsheim wants to do could not be done that \iftrue and \iffalse were invented. -- Jerry ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- %%% The TeXhax digest is brought to you as a service of the TeX Users Group %%% in cooperation with the UnixTeX distribution service at the %%% University of Washington %%% %%% Concerning subscriptions, address changes, unsubscribing: %%% BITNET: send a one-line mail message to LISTSERV@xxx %%% where xxx is the nearest geographical site in the %%% tree shown below %%% SUBSCRIBE TEX-L % to subscribe %%% or UNSUBSCRIBE TEX-L %%% Here is the BITNET re-distribution tree as shown in a recent %%% REVIEW (The geography is guessed at from the subscription list) %%% %%% CLVM TAMVM1 FINHUTC %%% | | (Finland, UK, Scand, CERN) %%% | | | %%% TeXhax ----> UWAVM ----- MARIST ----- EB0UB011 ----- BNANDP11 %%% | (France,Italy,Spain) (Belgium) %%% | | %%% UBVM HEARN --- DEARN %%% (Netherlands) (Germany) %%% %%% Internet: send a similar one line mail message to %%% TeXhax-request@cs.washington.edu %%% Please be sure you send a valid internet address!! %%% in the form name@domain or name%routing@domain %%% and use the style of the Bitnet one-line message, so that %%% we can find your subscription request easily. %%% %%% All submissions to: TeXhax@cs.washington.edu %%% %%% Back issues available for FTPing as: %%% machine: directory: filename: %%% JUNE.CS.WASHINGTON.EDU TeXhax/TeXhaxyy.nn %%% yy = last two digits of current year %%% nn = issue number %%% %%% For further information about TeX Users Group services and publications %%% contact Karen at KLB@SEED.AMS.COM or write to TUG at %%% TeX Users Group %%% P.O. 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