Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.milw.wisc.edu!lll-winken!uunet!cme!libes
From: libes@cme.nbs.gov (Don Libes)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: a word-processor for UNIX
Message-ID: <1439@muffin.cme.nbs.gov>
Date: 25 Jul 89 19:00:18 GMT
References: <20306@adm.BRL.MIL> <26558@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <8467@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu> <26567@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <1552@garcon.cso.uiuc.edu> <10604@smoke.BRL.MIL>
Reply-To: libes@cme.nbs.gov (Don Libes)
Organization: National Institute of Standards and Technology
Lines: 33

>Most of the Unix books published by Prentice-Hall have been typsest
>using troff, and the AWK book and Stroustrup's C++ book were too.

I think the real reason is that Prentice-Hall made a decision several
years ago to go to troff.  They apparently have a small staff of
troff-hackers that will convert things from whatever you give them.
Faced with this sillyness, it isn't surprising that authors use troff
if they have it.

>Not everybody feels the need to announce how they produced their book,
>but I do have a significant number of books whose publication information
>page includes a declaration that they were prepared using troff, etc. on
>UNIX with e.g. an APS-5 phototypesetter.  Nobody in the UNIX world is
>likely to mention what text editor they used in preparing the book.

Our book was prepared using FrameMaker.  All text editing was done
using FrameMaker.  (The FrameMaker editor is a large subset of emacs.)
I think FrameMaker is amazingly well-done, whether or not you already
know emacs.

My co-author and I were both experienced with troff and Mac utilities,
and actually did some writing using each to see how it would go.  As
we beat our heads against the wall for the 50th time, Frame
coincidentally appeared on the market, and we switched to that.  Upon
reflection, we are quite amazed that the serendipity caused by our
several restarts left us so happy.

Prentice-Hall told us that they had a program to convert PostScript to
troff (yeah, we thought this was a riot, too).  But we went out and
contracted for the camera-ready copy ourselves with a local PostScript
print shop.

Don Libes          libes@cme.nist.gov      ...!uunet!cme-durer!libes