Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ncrlnk!ncr-sd!hp-sdd!andrea
From: andrea@hp-sdd.HP.COM (Andrea K. Frankel)
Newsgroups: comp.graphics
Subject: Re: need descriptions
Keywords: sqml cal
Message-ID: <1679@hp-sdd.HP.COM>
Date: 18 Nov 88 21:35:30 GMT
References: <3270@entire.UUCP> <1665@hp-sdd.HP.COM> <1988Nov16.234857.2372@cs.rochester.edu>
Reply-To: andrea@hp-sdd.UUCP (Andrea K. Frankel)
Distribution: na
Organization: Hewlett-Packard, San Diego Division
Lines: 57

In article <1988Nov16.234857.2372@cs.rochester.edu> ken@cs.rochester.edu (Ken Yap) writes:
>|There is an ISO standard SGML (Standard Graphics Markup Language) which
>|isn't exactly a printer description level, but a metalanguage in which
>|one can describe many different kinds of output languages.  You can buy
>|SGML from ANSI in New York.
>
>Er, isn't this Standard Generalized Markup Language? As I understand,
>it is a system for defining conventions to be used for the transmission
>of marked-up documents. For instance, a tag like <q> can be defined to
>mean "start of quoted text". It is not a typesetting language. A SGML
>document can be turned into formatter input via a translator. SGML
>definitions are intended to be at a higher level of abstraction than
>formatter directives.
>
>I shouldn't say more because I'm not an expert. The experts are on
>comp.text.


You're absolutely right!  I was trying to retrieve the acronym from memory,
and ended up generating an approximation algorithmically when I couldn't
find an exact bit match ;@) ;@) ;@) 

My understanding is that there are simultaneously two types of organization
in SGML - logical and layout.  The former allows you to specify things like
sections, chapters, subsections and so forth that pertain to the logical
structure of the contents.  The layout talks about how text flows onto
the page, what a paragraph looks like, what kinds of things you do at
start of section/chapter/etc.  Taken together, you can transmit in SGML
a pretty detailed description of your document and how you want it to look,
at which point the recipient can translate it to troff, PostScript, or
whatever language the typesetter uses.  

BTW, my colloquial use of the prefix "meta" in "metalanguage" was meant
to imply that SGML is at a higher level of abstraction, and is in fact
a language in which one can describe what typesetter languages do in
terms of abstract functionality.

Apparently SGML is catching on at corporate-level communications
departments, where it is being used to standardize electronic sharing
of documentation and also to standardize the "style sheets" if you
will.  It seems to be mentioned more frequently by Europeans than
Americans, although I don't have any real data on relative availability
of implementations.

At any rate, the SGML folks I've talked to are confident that SGML
documents can be translated into just about anything that has enough
positioning control and the right fonts, so it doesn't appear to be a
standard that graphics folks need to worry much about (yet?).


Andrea Frankel, Hewlett-Packard (San Diego Division) (619) 592-4664
                "...I brought you a paddle for your favorite canoe."
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