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From: herndon@mingus.SRC.Honeywell.COM (William Herndon)
Newsgroups: comp.text
Subject: LaTeX seems not to obey the rules.
Message-ID: <24349@srcsip.UUCP>
Date: 22 Jun 89 03:23:32 GMT
Sender: news@src.honeywell.COM
Lines: 48



    In a document that I am creating using LaTeX, I need to place a
    pair of data structures on facing pages at the top of their
    respective pages.  There will also be text starting on the
    even-side page just below the first structure and continuing, if
    necessary, onto the odd-side page below the second structure.

    I have found that the easiest way to do this is to immediately
    place both structures into separate figures using the figure 
    environment.  I also restrict their placement to the top of
    the page only and set the counter 'totalnumber' ( the maximum
    number of figures that can appear on a page ) to one.

    This would seem a straight-forward way to solve the problem and 
    works fine when there is enough text to cause the even-side page
    to fill up, forcing some text to be placed on the odd-side page.
    However, when there is not enough text to spill over onto the 
    odd-side page the structure on that page comes out centered,
    regardless of the fact that I explicitly restricted it to the top.

    Now, I am by no means an expert on LaTeX, but I am guessing that,
    when figures are created, glue with a very high amount of stretch
    ( correct terminology? ) is added to both sides.  If there is no
    text to take up the rest of the page, the glue stretches and
    "snaps" the figure to the center.  

    Am I on the right track?  Can anybody suggest a way to get around 
    this problem?  Help, the book ( LaTeX by Lamport ) doesn't say 
    anything that explains this behavior!  In fact, the rules govern-
    ing figures seem to indicate that this should not be happening.
    Thanks in advance.


                                                         - Max


----------------------------------------------------------------------
William R. Herndon                      WHerndon@cim-vax.honeywell.com 
                                        herndon@src.honeywell.com
SCTC, Honeywell 	                
2855 Anthony Ln. So. #130               (612) 782-7108
St. Anthony, Mn. 55418

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