Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!bonnie.concordia.ca!thunder.mcrcim.mcgill.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!usc!julius.cs.uiuc.edu!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!csrd.uiuc.edu!s41.csrd.uiuc.edu!eijkhout From: eijkhout@s41.csrd.uiuc.edu (Victor Eijkhout) Newsgroups: comp.text.tex Subject: TeX and LaTeX (was: Re: Using TeX... Message-ID: <1991Jan14.154534.13880@csrd.uiuc.edu> Date: 14 Jan 91 15:45:34 GMT References: <680@shum.huji.ac.il> Sender: news@csrd.uiuc.edu (news) Organization: UIUC Center for Supercomputing Research and Development Lines: 28 maschler@VMS.HUJI.AC.IL (MICHAEL MASCHLER) writes: >In article <1991Jan11.174901.6071@csrd.uiuc.edu>, eijkhout@s41.csrd.uiuc.edu (Vi >ctor Eijkhout) writes... >>Douglas.Miller@viccol.edu.au (Douglas Miller) writes: >> >>>You should use LaTeX or DOCUMENT, not TeX >> >>Using LaTeX is using TeX. You probably mean 'plain TeX'. >Judging from the many questions I see in comp.text.tex and other places, >of the type "how do you do this and that in Latex?" I would answer -- switch >to plain TeX. The general character of those questions is cosmetic. How do I indent, set margins, whatever. It is very well to use plain TeX if you are good enough a programmer to make your own cross-referencing macros and table of contents, but for the mere mortals who can't do that, LaTeX (and lately Lams-TeX) is the only choice. I would never want to live without that sort of macros anyway. The time of checking references in the text by hand is long past! Maybe Phyzzx and TeXsis are a way out: they are add-on products to plain TeX, and probably have things like table of contents. Victor.