Path: utzoo!censor!geac!torsqnt!hybrid!scifi!bywater!uunet!van-bc!jtc
From: jtc@van-bc.wimsey.bc.ca (J.T. Conklin)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc
Subject: Re: "TeX" (was Re: Capitalization & programming language names)
Message-ID: <1499@van-bc.wimsey.bc.ca>
Date: 21 Jan 91 02:07:49 GMT
References: <1991Jan11.203246.12599@nixtdc.uucp> <1991Jan13.231540.3218@csis.dit.csiro.au> <1991Jan21.122438.2750@waikato.ac.nz>
Organization: SEAC Software Engineering, Vancouver, B.C., Canada
Lines: 24

In article <1991Jan21.122438.2750@waikato.ac.nz> ldo@waikato.ac.nz (Lawrence D'Oliveiro, Waikato University) writes:
>For some reason, netters have felt that the subscripting was more
>important to indicate than the case of the letters, hence the ASCII
>representation as "TeX".

The TeX representation was created by Knuth himself, as TEX is the
name of another text processing package.  

	``On the other hand, it's important to notice another thing
about TeX's name: The `E' is out of kilter.  This displaced `E' is a
reminder that TeX is about typesetting, and it distinguishes TeX from
other system names.  In fact, TEX (pronounced tecks) is the admirable
Text EXecutive processor developed by Honeywell Information Systems.
Since these two system names are pronounced quite differently, they
should also be spelled differently.  The correct way to refer to TeX
in a computer file, or when using some other medium that doesn't allow
lowering of the `E', is to type `TeX'.  Then there will be no
confusion with similar names, and people will be primed to pronounce
everything correctly.''

	-- Donald E. Knuth, The TeXbook

-- 
J.T. Conklin	jtc@wimsey.bc.ca, ...!{uunet,ubc-cs}!van-bc!jtc