Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!iuvax!rutgers!elbereth.rutgers.edu!cje From: cje@elbereth.rutgers.edu (Cthulhu's Jersey Epopt) Newsgroups: comp.text Subject: Re: yet another new TeX user aghast at the "TeXBook" !!!!!! Message-ID: Date: 28 Apr 89 13:43:14 GMT References: <433@pbseps.UUCP> <3847@utastro.UUCP> Organization: Miskatonic U. Computer Operations & User Services Lines: 34 Cc: cje In article <3847@utastro.UUCP> hgcjr@utastro.UUCP (Harold G. Corwin Jr.) writes: > For all its faults, the LaTeX manual is much easier for beginners to get > something out of than the TeXbook. Full agreement here. > Don't forget, too, that TeX is a TYPESETTING system. Most of us > aren't typesetters, and don't want to be. ... But easy? > TeX? No way. Made any easier using the TeXbook? Only if your job > is typesetting and you're being paid to wade through a jungle of > lions and dangerous curves. End of flame. But I think that's precisely why LaTeX was created. It's not necessary for anyone who wants to typeset their technical paper to learn raw TeX. Here at Rutgers, my job *is* to wade through the jungle of lions and dangerous curves. I try to direct people interested in TeX to LaTeX instead. When a user has a need that LaTeX seemingly can't handle, I either find a way to get LaTeX to do it or I dig out the TeXbook. Any site that uses TeX ought to have a similar support person (I hesitate to call myself a "TeX guru") so that users like Harold can pay attention to advances in astronomy instead of advances in TeX. But if you're hooked on TeX and *want* to Know All, it's misplaced to complain that the technical reference isn't suitable for beginners. Beginners belong with LaTeX. -- Yog-Sothoth Neblod Zin, Chris Jarocha-Ernst UUCP: {ames, cbosgd, harvard, moss, seismo}!rutgers!elbereth.rutgers.edu!cje ARPA: JAROCHAERNST@CANCER.RUTGERS.EDU