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From: chris@mimsy.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.text
Subject: Re: Why troff?
Message-ID: <5183@mimsy.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 25-Jan-87 15:10:29 EST
Article-I.D.: mimsy.5183
Posted: Sun Jan 25 15:10:29 1987
Date-Received: Mon, 26-Jan-87 02:46:46 EST
References: <362@linus.UUCP> <765@nrcvax.UUCP>
Distribution: comp.text
Organization: U of Maryland, Dept. of Computer Science, Coll. Pk., MD 20742
Lines: 37
Keywords: TeX, troff

>sdo@linus.UUCP (Sean David O'Neil) says:
>>Anyone who can use troff can learn to use TeX, so simplicity can't
>>be the reason, and besides there are lots of really simple WYSIWYG
>>formatters around today, so convenience seems unlikely as well.
>>Is it just inertia?

There are some real reasons to stick with troff, though they often
translate to some form of inertia.  There are a large number of things
that work with troff that are not widely implemented for TeX---pic and
grap come to mind; there is a tpic for TeX but no equivalent to grap---
and there is a large software base built around troff that would take
much time and effort to modify to use TeX.  That time and effort has
little or no payoff to those using the existing software.  (To those
*maintaining* it, on the other hand. . . .  `Do not meddle in the
affairs of troff, for it is subtle and quick to anger.')

In article <765@nrcvax.UUCP> terry@nrcvax.UUCP (Terry Grevstad) writes:
>I don't know about inertia.  If you are perfectly satisfied with what
>you have where is the impetus to change?

Exactly.  Inertia, but this can be called neither good nor bad.

>I love troff.  I tell it exactly what to do, and it does it.  I like
>the complete control and flexibility it gives me. ...

Both TeX and troff contain true programming languages, and one can
do virtually anything in either.  Personally, I find it easier to
instruct TeX as to what I want.  I have used both, neither terribly
extensively, and worked first with troff.  In spite of the well
known (but is it real?) tendency for programmers to prefer their
first languages, I switched as soon as I discovered TeX, as I have
never liked two-letter name spaces.  (My first programming language
was a two-letter dialect of BASIC, which I outgrew.  I moved *up*
to FORTRAN.  Functions and six letter local variables!  What ecstasy! :-) )
-- 
In-Real-Life: Chris Torek, Univ of MD Comp Sci Dept (+1 301 454 7690)
UUCP:	seismo!mimsy!chris	ARPA/CSNet:	chris@mimsy.umd.edu