Xref: utzoo comp.text:7743 comp.text.tex:4382 Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mcsun!ukc!edcastle!dcl-cs!aber-cs!athene!pcg From: pcg@cs.aber.ac.uk (Piercarlo Grandi) Newsgroups: comp.text,comp.text.tex Subject: Re: Using TeX for the UNIX man pages Message-ID: Date: 12 Dec 90 19:30:03 GMT References: <657@silence.princeton.nj.us> <1990Dec4.130922.6961@bellcore.bellcore.com> <1990Dec4.133655.15047@noao.edu> <1990Dec4.211419.2599@robobar.co.uk> <4344@undis.cs.chalmers.se> Sender: aro@aber-cs.UUCP Organization: Coleg Prifysgol Cymru Lines: 44 Nntp-Posting-Host: odin In-reply-to: jeffrey@cs.chalmers.se's message of 7 Dec 90 11:53:15 GMT On 7 Dec 90 11:53:15 GMT, jeffrey@cs.chalmers.se (Alan Jeffrey) said: jeffrey> In article jeffrey> pcg@cs.aber.ac.uk (Piercarlo Grandi) writes: pcg> Naturally this as always leaves the problem of getting TeX to print pcg> decently (dvidoc does not quite get it right) on any low resolution pcg> device. I may well look into this eventually; all we need is to modify pcg> TeX so that it does all positioning in units that are a multiple of its pcg> fundamental resolution, just like ditroff does already. jeffrey> No thanks! TeX has got to be device-independent, if you're planning jeffrey> to use if for serious 2000dpi typesetting, with proofs at 300dpi and jeffrey> previews as low as 72dpi. TeX does a pretty decent job of placing jeffrey> text where you want it, it's the device drivers that often can't cope. No, this is unfortunately wrong. Currently TeX assumes an output device of nearly infinite precision, and with all the CM fonts and symbols. The problem is that no such device exists; for high resolution devices where CM can be downloaded the mapping from the ideal device to the actual device can be done in some haphazard way in the DVI driver. The problem is tht while you can a device independent output format, you cannot really have device independent output. For example you may use a symbol that exists on some printers but non on others. Or, you may want to output to a printer has has only fixed width fonts and no proportional fonts, not to mention CM. In order to have the best results for type of printer one must produce different DVI files; it is no good to have a DVI file that was built assuming the printer had CM fonts with their widths and trying to print in Apalatino (TM) on a PostScript device. You *can* do it in the DVU postprocessor, but the output will be ugly, as it will have to print Palatino characters at positions determined by CM widths. What we need for efficient printing of TeX(info) output on fixed pitch printer is a set of font descriptions that specify constant width fonts throughout and glue that stretches only by fixed increments for interword and interline spacing. Dvidoc seems a start in this direction; does anybody know of any more advanced technology? -- Piercarlo Grandi | ARPA: pcg%uk.ac.aber.cs@nsfnet-relay.ac.uk Dept of CS, UCW Aberystwyth | UUCP: ...!mcsun!ukc!aber-cs!pcg Penglais, Aberystwyth SY23 3BZ, UK | INET: pcg@cs.aber.ac.uk