Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!mit-eddie!think!harvard!seismo!mcvax!ukc!warwick!req From: req@warwick.UUCP (Russell Quin) Newsgroups: net.text Subject: TeX Questions Message-ID: <439@snow.warwick.UUCP> Date: Sun, 9-Mar-86 13:27:37 EST Article-I.D.: snow.439 Posted: Sun Mar 9 13:27:37 1986 Date-Received: Sat, 15-Mar-86 18:34:56 EST Reply-To: req@warwick.UUCP (Russell Quin) Organization: Computer Science, Warwick University, UK Lines: 71 Socks: light brown I would like to know if TeX can handle the features mentioned below, and if so, how. Ditroff can already do some of them, and the others can be hacked in, but a subsequent move to TeX might mean that all the design (and programming) work would become worthless. Punctuation: 1 Hung punctuation (this is where punctuation marks at the beginning or end of a line extend into the margin in justified text. It is chiefly used to avoid making ugly `holes' in the otherwise neat straight lines of the margins). Look at the above line, for example. 2 Punctuation a different size than the text (this is sometimes done in quotes or headings, as well as in book text when the punctuation marks are too small (or to large). Sometimes only some marks are affected, typically points and quotes, and possibly accents). Footnotes: 3 The problem here is to avoid carrying over onto the next page part any part of a footnote that would leave behind a complete sentence (Hart's is even stricter, requiring that the page break doesn't leave behind a complete phrase or clause). The idea is that footnotes which span several pages are confusing enough as it is, without compounding the situation further! There should be a note to the effect that the footnote is continued overleaf, if appropriate, of course. End-of-sentence detection is difficult, of course, but the troff-style rule of saying that a sentence ends when an input line ends with punctuation --- which can be refined further by adding the rule that there be a capital at the start of the next input text line --- seems to be sufficient in practice. One might also consider using limited NL-parsing in the manner of style and diction, but this is beginning to sound like too much work for too little return. Optical Alignment: 4 Large letters need to be set closer together than small ones. Titling often looks ragged if ``mechanical'' letterspacing is used to align the margin, because some of the letters have ``holes'' in them. A heading like The Hung Punctuation will often look odd if the cross-piece of the `T' doesn't protrude left beyond the H and P. The exact amount of overhang needs to be worked out manually for each letter now, although it could conceivably be mechanized. Ideally, though, TeX (or Troff, or whatever) would be able to use that information to align the title optically. Since TeX already has kerning, can it already cope with this case? If not, how hard would it be to add it? (I am not prepared to consider solutions to any of these problems which are not automatic. It's unacceptable to have to type something like {\align The // Hung // Punctuation } or {\hang ,}; for footnotes, it is reasonable for users to start each sentence on a new line, however.) There are other issues which cause difficulties, but I will leave them until I need to deal with them! Sometimes a document needs to be reprinted in a different style, and it's very important that the number of textual alterations to be made is very low. This means that things like hung punctuation cannot be specifically inserted by the writer, of course, as line-breaks may change. (In any event, no-one is likely to want to type (say) \*. or \*('' instead of . and '. Perhaps careful use of sed would make it possible.) I am looking for elegant solutions. Thankyou (in advance) for your help, as well as you patience in reading a long article (set with hung punctuation on the right margin). Russell -- ... mcvax!ukc!warwick!req (req@warwick.UUCP) ... mcvax!ukc!warwick!frplist (frplist@warwick.UUCP) inchar = pinchar /* XXX */