Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!van-bc!ubc-cs!alberta!calgary!enme1!witold From: witold@enme1.ucalgary.ca (Witold Jan Owoc) Newsgroups: comp.text Subject: Re: Why learn Tex? Summary: Some things one cannot do without the markup language Message-ID: <2566@cs-spool.calgary.UUCP> Date: 1 Mar 90 22:29:44 GMT Expires: 1 Mar 90 22:29:43 GMT References: <2547@castle.ed.ac.uk> Sender: news@calgary.UUCP Reply-To: witold@enme.UCalgary.CA (Witold Owoc) Followup-To: comp.text Organization: UC, Calgary, Alberta, Canada Lines: 34 In article rusty@garnet.berkeley.edu (rusty wright) writes: >Some people argue that with mark up systems (tex, troff, etc.) you can >do things like automatic numbering of sections, figures, etc. or do >global reformatting via macros (for example, change all section heads >to use a different font). This may still be mostly true but I suspect >as time goes by the wysiwyg systems will start allowing you to do this >as well. In fact, I would guess that in time they will allow you to >do everything that you can do in tex. The WYSI(A)WYG - A standing for almost - systems available for UNIX already have the above features (names not included on purpose). It allows to obtain consistency and professional look even throughout the large documents. But... the best possible placement of equations in WYSI(A)WYG I have obtained using the eqn (troff equation preprocessor) language, being invoked from within WYSI(A)WYG system. Here the analogy of S. Matthews mentioned in the article <2547@castle.ed.ac.uk> >The difference is analogous to the difference between compilers and >interpreters (don't push the analogy to far, though). should be recalled. With some objects like mathematical equations (and I suspect the tables) program has to know all the components before taking decision upon the placement. Please do not flame on me that one or another wordprocessor is able to handle equations. I am talking about *mathematics* not just integrals and subscripts. On a side if mathematics is that what you wanted you would better use TeX (contact AMS about LamS-TeX). You can get more from it than with eqn | troff pair. Regards Witold PS. Please consider also why it is Almost What You Get. witold@enme.UCalgary.CA | Witold Owoc witold%enme@UNCANET.BITNET | The University of Calgary, Canada uunet!ubc-cs!calgary!enme1!witold |Department of Mechanical Engineering ...alberta!/