TeXhax Digest Friday, December 4, 1987 Volume 87 : Issue 98 [SCORE.STANFORD.EDU]TEXHAX98.87 Editor: Malcolm Brown Today's Topics: %% correction for UK distribution contact Problem with dvi2ps vs. LaserWriter Easy and Automatic VBOX Width Setting re: sub-sampled fonts Re: HP LaserJet fonts and TeX Graphics in TeX on an LN03? Re: Using HP LJ download fonts with TeX Bug in gftopk.web (1.4) standard paper size is not US letter LaTeX figure occupying a whole page TeX Update Tex on Decnet Chess font? WEAVE and TANGLE on MS-DOS (TeXhax Digest V87 #96) Ada/TeX WEB Duty cycles on LaserWriters vs Imagens 1988 TUG Annual Meeting ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 5 Dec 87 From: Malcolm Brown Subject: correction for UK distribution contact %% In the many weeks since I sent off the note on TeXhax that appeared %% in the most recent issue of TUGboat, it's come to my attention that %% the contact address (postie etc.) for UK redistribution doesn't work. %% %% Happily, in the column right next to the TeXhax note, there is a note %% by Graham Toal. He lists the address for subscribing to the UK %% redistribution of TeXhax as: %% %% texhax-request@uk.ac.ucl.cs.nss %% %% In the interests of network conservation, I urge all those in the UK %% who receive TeXhax directly from Score to switch to the UK %% redistribution. A glance at the mailer header that arrives with %% your digest shoudl tell you this. You'll know that you've successfully %% subscribed when you start receiving duplicate digests. At point, a %% note to texhax-request@score.stanford.edu will remove you from the %% Score listing. %% %% Malcolm %% ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 28 Nov 87 16:01:23 PST From: Greg Earle Subject: Problem with dvi2ps vs. LaserWriter [ Apologies for only being vaguely TeX-ish oriented ] I'm using Stephen Bechtolsheim's `dvipsps' package, which includes a version of dvi2ps (Is there a `standard' dvi2ps? Seems like we got a million of 'em), the `dvipr' script for outputting to a LaserWriter (or Imagen), and support for being able to use the built-in LaserWriter fonts from TeX. This seems so simple I wonder why I haven't seen anything on it yet. After installing the dvipsps package (*without* the font support; just vanilla dvi2ps basically), I tried to print Mike Urban's `Guide to TeX for TROFF users' paper that comes with each UNIX TeX distribution. It's about 32 or so pages long; the print job lumbers along, then about page 28 the LaserWriter gets a hiccup, returns an `ioerror: Offending Command 000000NNNN00 (or some other large chunk of bitmap)' and the LW resets itself! This happens at the same point in the job every time; to get around it, I have to use `dviselect' to pull little chunks of the document (around the offending part) and print it out in sections; trying to print the entire document never works. If anyone has any ideas or has seen this themselves, a little illumination would be appreciated ... - Greg Greg Earle earle@mahendo.JPL.NASA.GOV Gainfully unemployed earle%mahendo@jpl-elroy.ARPA [aka:] earle%mahendo@elroy.JPL.NASA.GOV Los Angeles, CA ...!cit-vax!elroy!jplgodo!mahendo!earle ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 28 Nov 87 23:55 EST From: Subject: Easy and Automatic VBOX Width Setting Jim Walker asks in TeXhax Volume 87 Issue 96: % ... something like % \vbox{\obeylines line 1 % line 2 % } % builds a \vbox of width \hsize. Is there an easy way to make a % \vbox just wide enough for its longest line without enclosing % each line in an explicit \hbox? The \obeylines causes the \par command to be added to the end of each line; the \hskip\parfillskip in the \par is what was filling out each line to \hsize. One fix (maybe not the easiest) is to invent a new command, here called \autocr, that borrows the trick used in \obeylines but instead makes the end of each line a \cr instead of a \par. Then, we let the good old \halign command do the work. Note that we must then end each line with % where we do not really want a \cr automatically added. The \hrule was added to the example to help show the width of the two \vbox's that are created. {\catcode`\~~M=\active\gdef\autocr{\catcode`\~~M=\active \let~~M=\cr}} \line{% \vbox{\autocr\halign{&# \noalign{\hrule}% this is column one }} \hfill \vbox{\autocr\halign{&# \noalign{\hrule}% this is column two }} } \bye SKETCH OF OUTPUT FROM EXAMPLE: ------ ------ this this is is column column one two Kent Eschenberg Applied Research Laboratory, Penn State University, State College, PA BITNET Address KEE@PSUARLC ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 28 Nov 87 23:17:33 CST From: grunwald@m.cs.uiuc.edu (Dirk Grunwald) Subject: re: sub-sampled fonts In TeXHaX V87 #96, Don Hosek asks about algorithms to subsample fonts. If you have access to the Arpanet, you can pick up the files 'pub/iptex.tar' or 'pub/iptex.tar.Z' from host 'a.cs.uiuc.edu' using anon FTP. This contains a font-compression algorithm which compresses a font by a certain 'shrink', i.e. a 3-shrink takes a 9x12 font & reduces it to 3x4. This code is part of the TeXsun & TeXx previewers. It should prove easy to adapt to other purposes. dirk grunwald univ. of illinois grunwald@m.cs.uiuc.edu ------------------------------ Subject: Re: HP LaserJet fonts and TeX Date: Sun, 29 Nov 87 00:46:23 -0800 From: Jerry Sweet > We would like to use HP LaserJet soft fonts with TeX... For the IBM PC at least, DVILASER/HP, ArborText's commercial DVI=>HP converter, does handle the soft fonts for the TmsRmn/Helv set (HP catalog #33412AC); .tfm files are included. It is not inconceivable that ArborText would have their software running on other hosts. The phone number is 313/996-3566. According to the DVILASER/HP manual, HP can provide metric data for their fonts, but not in .tfm format. The HP fonts don't have ligatures. Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with ArborText, except as a mostly-satisfied customer ("mostly" because I want support for landscape mode). Hope this helps. -jns ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 29 Nov 87 13:26 EST From: Subject: Graphics in TeX on an LN03? We're using Rose's DVI converter to drive an LN03 on a VAX VMS system. Is there another DVI converter around, or a modification of Rose's, that will allow one to embed graphics in one's TeX output? It ought to be doable, since one can do it (painfully) by hand. Rich Holmes rich@suhep.bitnet ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 29 Nov 87 12:23:36 EDT From: Dimitri Vulis Subject: Re: Using HP LJ download fonts with TeX >Date: Thu, 19 Nov 87 09:29:35 mst >From: ihnp4!convex!txsil!stan (Stanley E. Bammel) >Subject: HP LaserJet fonts and TeX > >We would like to use HP LaserJet soft fonts with TeX and wonder if >anyone else has had the same need. I too use HPLJ2. I downloaded a family of nice Script and Old English fonts for it off a BBS and wanted to be able to use them with TeX. I spent some time researching the problem, but I was too busy/lazy to produce any concrete code that I could share. One CAN write a program that will read the download file and interpret the escape sequences, which are listed in the HP manual. At the beginning you have a font header and then for every character you have info like character width followed by the raster. Since the two are intermixed, you might as well generate both PL and PXL files (and then convert them to TFM and PK if you're up to it :). I WAS/AM going to do this myself when I get a chance and post the results. DV ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 29 Nov 87 17:11:49 PST From: KARNEY%PPC.MFENET@NMFECC.ARPA Subject: Bug in gftopk.web (1.4) There's a paren missing in the new gftopk.web (1.4). @x while (row[row_ptr] = end_of_row do incr(row_ptr) ; @y while (row[row_ptr] = end_of_row) do incr(row_ptr) ; @z Charles Karney Plasma Physics Laboratory Phone: +1 609 683 2607 Princeton University MFEnet: Karney@PPC.MFEnet PO Box 451 ARPAnet: Karney%PPC.MFEnet@NMFECC.ARPA Princeton, NJ 08544-0451 Bitnet: Karney%PPC.MFEnet@ANLVMS.Bitnet ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 30 Nov 87 17:07:34 +1100 From: "Christopher Vance (cxv) and Patrick Tang (gyp)" Subject: standard paper size is not US letter Australia, like almost all the world (except the USA, and other world powers such as Burma and Brunei), is a metric country. As a result of this, we use international size paper in our laser printer, rather than US letter size, which is probably unavailable even if we did want to use it (we don't). Unfortunately, LaTeX is built around the US size paper, and in a particularly nasty way. It appears that all the settings for page size are precalculated and scattered through a large proportion of the LaTeX style files we have looked at. Surely this fails the programming principle of avoiding precalculated magic numbers to aid configurability; what is worse, the calculations seem to be undocumented in their rationale. May we make a plea for sanity when LaTeX is updated, and for any new style files which are distributed in future: is it possible for the physical paper size to be set in precisely ONE place (presumably in latex.tex?) with all sizes like \textwidth, \oddsidemargin (if appropriate), etc., calculated by LaTeX itself from these changeable sizes? This should make it possible for everyone to use the same style files without regard to physical paper size, and to enable each site to set the default size to its usual (or only) available paper size, while still enabling users to tell LaTeX to use a different size if desired (like if they import a box of paper from overseas). Currently, there are a number of different attempts at an A4 style option [one is included below], but none of them seem satisfactory, perhaps because there are so many places in the style files where sizes are set, and perhaps because none of them seems to be complete. Is it possible for a pronouncement to be made from on high which will bring an end to this profusion of attempts, a pronouncement including ALL the relevant changes? Indeed, a pronouncement from Leslie Lamport himself? [In general, we are quite happy with LaTeX, and consider it to be a GOOD THING, and are thankful for all Dr Lamport's hard work.] Could LaTeX be fixed to do the right thing for future releases? Having separate US and international versions of all the style files is not a good idea. A suitable pronouncement could be one or more of: * corrected style files; * an A4 document style option which changes ALL the relevant sizes; * guidelines on calculating all the sizes, together with some idea where all the places are which need to be changed (like we probably missed something in the attempt below). A (partial?) attempt at an A4 style option - we're not trying to push this one, especially if something better exists or if we missed something: % a4.sty % usage: \documentstyle[a4,...]{report} % % Christopher J.S. Vance, cxv@cs.adfa.oz[.au] % University College, University of New South Wales, Canberra, Australia % November 1987 % A4 paper with 25mm margins % is narrower than US letter paper with 1 inch margins % set \textheight and \texwidth for A4 with 25mm margins \textheight = 247.3 true mm % 297.3 - 2*25 \textwidth = 160.2 true mm % 210.2 - 2*25 % adjust \textheight for top/bottom margins \advance \textheight by -1 \topmargin \advance \textheight by -1 \headheight \advance \textheight by -1 \headsep \advance \textheight by -1 \footskip % adjust \textwidth for side margins % do it this way so we don't have to duplicate \twoside checks \advance \textwidth by -0.5 \oddsidemargin \advance \textwidth by -0.5 \evensidemargin % set \vsize and \hsize to match \textheight and \textwidth % is this necessary? does it even work? \vsize = \textheight \hsize = \textwidth ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 30 Nov 87 11:30 N From: Subject: LaTeX figure occupying a whole page I am trying to put a figure as large as one page (or a bit less) on a single page, without getting any normal text on that page. I have tried to arrange this by setting \topfraction to 1, and \textfraction to 0, but that did not work properly: I am still getting one line of text on my page, and by making my figure a tiny bit larger, the whole figure floats to the back of the document (I am using LaTeX, as you might have noticed). Who can help me out? Thanks Herman F. Vogt BITNET: VOGT@HGRRUG5.EARN ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 30 Nov 87 12:04 N From: (Johannes Braams) Subject: TeX Update Hi there, I would like to ask a maybe rather simple question, but as I am relatively new to using networks, I would like to now how I could get the update on TeX. We are running LaTeX/TeX on a VAX, running under VMS V4.6, having TeX 2.0 and LaTeX 2.09. We are on BITnet. Regards, Johannes Braams PTT Dr Neher Laboratories, Phone: +31 70 435172 P.o. box 421, BITNET/EARN: BRAAMS@HLSDNL50.BITNET 2260 AK Leidschendam, PSImail(X.25):PSI%2041170358::BRAAMS The Netherlands. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 30 Nov 87 15:23 N From: Subject: Tex on Decnet ******************************** * Announcing Tex on Decnet * ******************************** Thanks to the collaboration of several TeX-friends, we have created a depository for TeX and related software on Decnet in Italy. For any information, please send a mail message to: 39937::luvisetto or 39003::fisica The material at present available is listed below. Soon also Beebe's driver family will be added. We are looking for the last version of DviToVdu by A. Trevorrow (the one which uses .GF files). Any one is willing to contribute? Marisa Luvisetto and Massimo Calvani AMSTEX.DIR;1 The Amstex package BASES.DIR;1 Basic PLAIN files for Tex and Metafont BIBTEX.DIR;1 The Bibtex package CLD.DIR;1 *.cld files to install TeX in DCL tables CM.DIR;1 CM fonts definitions DOC.DIR;1 *.Tex files for Tex and Metafont manuals DVITOVDU.DIR;1 Preview by Andrew Trevorrow (thanks Andrew) EXE.DIR;1 All *.exe files FONTS.DIR;1 All *.TFM files FORMATS.DIR;1 Basic *.fmt files INPUTS.DIR;1 *.sty files for Latex LATEX.DIR;1 The Latex package LATEXSTYLE.DIR;1 The Latexstyle collection of Ken Yap (thanks Ken) LN03.DIR;1 Driver for DEC LN03 laserprinter LN_FONTS.DIR;1 Fonts for Ln03 in PK format LN_FONTS_GF.DIR;1 Fonts for LN03 in GF format (thanks John Sauter) LSEDIT.DIR;1 Lse module for Latex MF.DIR;1 Metafont MFWARE.DIR;1 Metafont PIXEL.DIR;1 *.pxl files at \magstep 1 --> 6 PSFIGTEX.DIR;1 Package to include Postscript files in TeX docs PSPRINT.DIR;1 Driver for Postscript Laserprinters by A. Trevorrow QMS.DIR;1 Driver for Qms/quick laserprinter QMS_FONTS.DIR;1 Fonts for Qms Laserprinter in GF format SAMPLES.DIR;1 Sample files for Tex and Latex SPELL.DIR;1 Speller utility SVI.DIR;1 Modules to produce 'save image' of exec. file TEX.DIR;1 .EXE files for Tex and Virtex TEXHAX.DIR;1 The TexHax magazine (thanks Malcolm Brown) TEXMAG.DIR;1 The Texmag magazine (thanks Don Hosek) TEXUK.DIR;1 The Uktex magazine (thanks Peter Abbott) TEXWARE.DIR;1 Tex related software as DViTYPE, TFTOPL, PLTOTF TRAP.DIR;1 Metafont torture test TRIP.DIR;1 Tex torture test WEB.DIR;1 Source for WEB programs, WEAVE and Tangle ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 30 Nov 87 08:53:38 MST From: dhk@lanl.gov (David Kratzer) Subject: Chess font? I have a friend who is writing a paper about a chess program and would like to typeset the chess board as well. Does anyone know of a font for chess pieces or a way to represent a chess board with pieces on it? David H. Kratzer, dhk@lanl.gov ARPAnet c10dhk@lampx1 BITNET essdp1::090245 SPAN (505) 667-5745 AT&T ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 28 Nov 87 20:53:49 PST From: mackay@june.cs.washington.edu (Pierre MacKay) Subject: WEAVE and TANGLE on MS-DOS (TeXhax Digest V87 #96) At the TeX Users Group Meeting in Seattle, Randy Best of Digital Composition Systems reported on a port of tangle to MS-DOS on an AT. Not only that, but Tangle was then used to produce a proper WEB port of TeX, which passed trip with full honors. The trick is to put everything into heap space. (Everything that can be put there.) For more information, get in touch with DCS at 602 870-7666. [Phoenix, AZ] Pierre MacKay ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 30 Nov 87 15:00 CST From: FERNANDEZ%sp.unisys.com@RELAY.CS.NET Subject: Ada/TeX WEB Does anyone out there know of an Ada/TeX implmentation of WEB? Sylvester Fernandez ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 30 Nov 87 15:28:47 PST From: Peter Scott Subject: Duty cycles on LaserWriters vs Imagens We are considering getting LaserWriters here to provide PostScript capability. We are currently using Imagens for output, and will continue to do so. However, the upgrade to provide PostScript support for Imagens costs more than a LaserWriter... the only consideration is an unknown quantity, the duty cycle of the LaserWriter. Does anyone have some first-hand figures or estimates for the MTBF for the LaserWriter? Supposedly the engine is rated at 100,000 pages. However, so is the Imagen's, and we have reached up to five times that on our Imagens without significant service. I'm interested in what you've found to be true with LaserWriters (medium-usage environment, ~100pp/day). Peter Scott (pjs@grouch.jpl.nasa.gov, pjs%grouch.span@jpl-vlsi.arpa) ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 30 Nov 87 16:56:52 PLT From: Dean Guenther Subject: 1988 TUG Annual Meeting As announced in this month's TUGboat, we are already putting together the 1988 TUG annual meeting. If you would like to speak at this year's meeting at McGill University, please send me a note by January 15. Abstracts are due on 3/18/88, and papers will be selected by 4/4/88. Suggestions for topics are in the TUBboat (V8N3). Dean Guenther TeX IBM VM/CMS Site Coordinator Washington State University Pullman, Wa. 99164-1220 phone: 509-335-0411 BITnet: GUENTHER@WSUVM1 ------------------------------ %%% %%% subscriptions, address changes to: texhax-request@score.stanford.edu %%% please send a valid arpanet address!! %%% %%% submissions to: texhax@score.stanford.edu %%% %%% BITNET redistribution: TEX-L@TAMVM1.BITNET (list server) %%% %%%\bye %%% ------------------------------ End of TeXhax Digest ************************** -------