Discussion:
[XeTeX] which TeX-based software
Carrs
2018-04-26 12:20:15 UTC
Permalink
Hi,

a newbie question. I would like advice on which TeX-based software it
would be best to learn in detail for my typesetting plans. So far, I
have learned a little TeX and a little LaTeX, but not enough of either
to tell me which will work best for me.

The features I want to be able to typeset are:

+ Roman script, in a Unicode environment. Some of the documents will
have special characters, but nothing exotic. (So I am thinking XeTeX or
XeLaTeX or something else Unicode-y ...)

+ handles a document with plenty of styles e.g. dictionary

+ double or single column on the page

+ can place cross references at bottom of page, or in L or R margin
lined up with caller, or in text area at end of paragraph, or in text
area at end of section.

+ plenty of illustrations of various sizes (that have to share the page
with footnotes, cross references etc)

+ the range of the paragraph numbers on a page can be shown in its header

+ with numbered sentences, can place the number in the margin without
messing up the paragraphing.

Other features I am looking for:

+ runs on Linux (and preferably also on Windows and Mac)

+ no recurring license fees

+ ideally would have some pre-existing materials/courses to help me
learn to use it

If all the software can do these things, I would appreciate any
recommendations you can make regarding the strengths and weaknesses of
the various options there are.

thanks

Chris
Philip Taylor (RHUoL)
2018-04-27 13:43:23 UTC
Permalink
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Zdenek Wagner
2018-04-27 14:15:46 UTC
Permalink
Hi,

everything from the TeX world is free and multiplatform. Of course, there
are nonfree text editors that can help you with creation of the source text
and running all task by pushing buttons on a task bar but they are not
needed and free tools are available.

Both plain XeTeX and XeLaTeX are built upon the same set of primitives, so
the capabilities are in principle equvalent. However, the approach is
different. Users of plain XeTeX are assumed to do everything ourselves,
packages for various tasks are not generally available. XeLaTeX users
typically use packages available on CTAN and hence in TeX Live. If you find
a package for your task, you can easily use it in your document.
Unfortunatelly, if the package is not configurable and extensible, you will
have to delve into the plain XeTeX which may be more difficult because
without understanding the package internals you can easily break it.

There is no simple advice. If you wish to become a TeXpert and you like to
find your own solutions without being bound by someone else's packages,
then plain XeTeX is for you. If you want to be just a user and suiotable
packages are available and you have a TeX guru nearby, then you can start
with XeLaTeX more quickly, produce required results and a guru will help
you with the difficult cases.


Zdeněk Wagner
http://ttsm.icpf.cas.cz/team/wagner.shtml
http://icebearsoft.euweb.cz
Post by Carrs
Hi,
a newbie question. I would like advice on which TeX-based software it
would be best to learn in detail for my typesetting plans. So far, I have
learned a little TeX and a little LaTeX, but not enough of either to tell
me which will work best for me.
The features I want to be able to typeset are: [many and complex]
XeTeX can do all of these, but the intellectual effort required of a
beginner is likely to prove nigh unsurmountable. I *expect* that XaLaTeX
can do the same with somewhat less intellectual input, but as I never use
LaTeX in any guise I am not the best person to advise.
Philip Taylor
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William Adams
2018-04-27 14:24:18 UTC
Permalink
As a person who really misses Textures, and has used a fair number of
commercial TeX products, no, it's not all opensource, though that's pretty
much all that's left these days, which is a powerful argument to the
virtues of opensource.

xelatex can do what you want, and I believe that if you start with a basic
document, in a robust documentclass such as memoir or koma, look up LaTeX
packages on CTAN and add them incrementally you'll eventually either arrive
at your goal, or determine that one or two things which you wish done are
not yet available as features. Once you determine what those are, you can
determine what's involved in either writing up that functionality on your
own, or hiring someone to do it.

William
Post by Zdenek Wagner
Hi,
everything from the TeX world is free and multiplatform. Of course, there
are nonfree text editors that can help you with creation of the source text
and running all task by pushing buttons on a task bar but they are not
needed and free tools are available.
Both plain XeTeX and XeLaTeX are built upon the same set of primitives, so
the capabilities are in principle equvalent. However, the approach is
different. Users of plain XeTeX are assumed to do everything ourselves,
packages for various tasks are not generally available. XeLaTeX users
typically use packages available on CTAN and hence in TeX Live. If you find
a package for your task, you can easily use it in your document.
Unfortunatelly, if the package is not configurable and extensible, you will
have to delve into the plain XeTeX which may be more difficult because
without understanding the package internals you can easily break it.
There is no simple advice. If you wish to become a TeXpert and you like to
find your own solutions without being bound by someone else's packages,
then plain XeTeX is for you. If you want to be just a user and suiotable
packages are available and you have a TeX guru nearby, then you can start
with XeLaTeX more quickly, produce required results and a guru will help
you with the difficult cases.
Zdeněk Wagner
http://ttsm.icpf.cas.cz/team/wagner.shtml
http://icebearsoft.euweb.cz
Post by Carrs
Hi,
a newbie question. I would like advice on which TeX-based software it
would be best to learn in detail for my typesetting plans. So far, I have
learned a little TeX and a little LaTeX, but not enough of either to tell
me which will work best for me.
The features I want to be able to typeset are: [many and complex]
XeTeX can do all of these, but the intellectual effort required of a
beginner is likely to prove nigh unsurmountable. I *expect* that
XaLaTeX can do the same with somewhat less intellectual input, but as I
never use LaTeX in any guise I am not the best person to advise.
Philip Taylor
--------------------------------------------------
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http://tug.org/mailman/listinfo/xetex
David J. Perry
2018-04-27 14:55:43 UTC
Permalink
Unless you have the mindset of a programmer and enjoy writing everything
from scratch, I would go with XeLaTeX rather than plain XeTeX.

William's advice about gradually locating packages that will help you is
good.  I have used the memoir class to typeset a fairly complex book
(side margins, many tables, etc.).  Memoir gives you a lot of control
over your page layout.  Its documentation is excellent and very
extensive.  As is usually the case with computer stuff, power =
complexity; you might want to work for a bit with one of the simpler
classes to get the hang of how things are done in XeLaTex before
plunging into learning memoir (or koma, which I don't have experience
with).
Post by Carrs
Hi,
a newbie question. I would like advice on which TeX-based software it
would be best to learn in detail for my typesetting plans. So far, I
have learned a little TeX and a little LaTeX, but not enough of either
to tell me which will work best for me.
+ Roman script, in a Unicode environment. Some of the documents will
have special characters, but nothing exotic. (So I am thinking XeTeX
or XeLaTeX or something else Unicode-y ...)
+ handles a document with plenty of styles e.g. dictionary
+ double or single column on the page
+ can place cross references at bottom of page, or in L or R margin
lined up with caller, or in text area at end of paragraph, or in text
area at end of section.
+ plenty of illustrations of various sizes (that have to share the
page with footnotes, cross references etc)
+ the range of the paragraph numbers on a page can be shown in its header
+ with numbered sentences, can place the number in the margin without
messing up the paragraphing.
+ runs on Linux (and preferably also on Windows and Mac)
+ no recurring license fees
+ ideally would have some pre-existing materials/courses to help me
learn to use it
If all the software can do these things, I would appreciate any
recommendations you can make regarding the strengths and weaknesses of
the various options there are.
thanks
Chris
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Wilfred van Rooijen
2018-04-28 01:27:17 UTC
Permalink
Allow me to contribute my two cents to the discussion.
First, it is my experience, and I also always tell my students, the following: "if you have something you want to typeset with LaTeX, somebody else has wanted that a long time ago, and yet someone else will have written a package for it". Thus, if you can find the correct package....... (obviously, that last step is not always easy and the package not always does exactly what you want).
Second, about unicode, my experiences are mixed. I use Japanese as my main language of communication. I found that "plain XeLaTeX" is not really adequate for Japanese as it lacks many common features; LuaLaTeX performs better, but still not as good as the pre-UTF-8 special "Japanese LaTeX" called "platex". In other words, even if XeLaTeX can typeset all unicode characters, you still need proper fonts, and special typesetting (such as indents, hyphenation rules, etc) may not be perfect.
If you are looking for something which based on TeX but closer to DTP software, check out ConTeXt. ConTeXt has been used for many complex, professional typesetting jobs, and the developers are very active in trying to find new solutions if needed. IIRC the current version of ConTeXt supports at least LuaLaTeX which provides support for UTF-8:
PRAGMA ADE web page: text

|
| |
PRAGMA ADE web page: text
| |

|



Another option is to check out the memoir class. The manual is intimidating (500+ pages) but it will do almost anything you want.

Personally, for basic English-language document, I use pdfLaTeX + memoir class; for Japanese, I use LuaLaTeX + ltjsbook (or ltjsarticle) class.
If you have many complicated typesetting issues in one document, you can also break down the document into individual tex files and glue everything together with pdftk or something similar. Only the management of the references etc becomes a bit of a problem.
Wilfred


On Friday, April 27, 2018 11:58 PM, David J. Perry <***@verizon.net> wrote:


Unless you have the mindset of a programmer and enjoy writing everything from scratch, I would go with XeLaTeX rather than plain XeTeX.

William's advice about gradually locating packages that will help you is good.  I have used the memoir class to typeset a fairly complex book (side margins, many tables, etc.).  Memoir gives you a lot of control over your page layout.  Its documentation is excellent and very extensive.  As is usually the case with computer stuff, power = complexity; you might want to work for a bit with one of the simpler classes to get the hang of how things are done in XeLaTex before plunging into learning memoir (or koma, which I don't have experience with). 

On 4/26/2018 8:20 AM, Carrs wrote:


Hi, a newbie question. I would like advice on which TeX-based software it would be best to learn in detail for my typesetting plans. So far, I have learned a little TeX and a little LaTeX, but not enough of either to tell me which will work best for me. The features I want to be able to typeset are:
+ Roman script, in a Unicode environment. Some of the documents will have special characters, but nothing exotic. (So I am thinking XeTeX or XeLaTeX or something else Unicode-y ...)
+ handles a document with plenty of styles e.g. dictionary
+ double or single column on the page
+ can place cross references at bottom of page, or in L or R margin lined up with caller, or in text area at end of paragraph, or in text area at end of section. + plenty of illustrations of various sizes (that have to share the page with footnotes, cross references etc)
+ the range of the paragraph numbers on a page can be shown in its header + with numbered sentences, can place the number in the margin without messing up the paragraphing. Other features I am looking for:
+ runs on Linux (and preferably also on Windows and Mac) + no recurring license fees + ideally would have some pre-existing materials/courses to help me learn to use it
If all the software can do these things, I would appreciate any recommendations you can make regarding the strengths and weaknesses of the various options there are. thanks
Chris

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Arthur Reutenauer
2018-04-28 16:12:26 UTC
Permalink
Post by Wilfred van Rooijen
Second, about unicode, my experiences are mixed. I use Japanese as my main language of communication. I found that "plain XeLaTeX" is not really adequate for Japanese as it lacks many common features; LuaLaTeX performs better, but still not as good as the pre-UTF-8 special "Japanese LaTeX" called "platex". In other words, even if XeLaTeX can typeset all unicode characters, you still need proper fonts, and special typesetting (such as indents, hyphenation rules, etc) may not be perfect.
In yet other words, the features you miss are about Japanese
typesetting, not Unicode. This is an important distinction since the
original poster doesn’t need to typeset Japanese.

As a an aside, if you’re talking about pTeX you should really mention
its UTF-8 extension, upTeX.
Post by Wilfred van Rooijen
If you are looking for something which based on TeX but closer to DTP software, check out ConTeXt. ConTeXt has been used for many complex, professional typesetting jobs, and the developers are very active in trying to find new solutions if needed. IIRC the current version of ConTeXt supports at least LuaLaTeX which provides support for UTF-8
The version that’s currently actively developed, Mark IV (mkiv) is
focused on LuaTeX, while the earlier version, Mark II, is more or less
frozen and supports pdfTeX and XeTeX.

Best,

Arthur


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Martin Schröder
2018-04-28 01:53:11 UTC
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Post by Wilfred van Rooijen
a newbie question. I would like advice on which TeX-based software it would
be best to learn in detail for my typesetting plans. So far, I have learned
a little TeX and a little LaTeX, but not enough of either to tell me which
will work best for me.
Please read https://www.tug.org/levels.html
Please clarify your specific problem or add additional details to
highlight exactly what you need. As it's currently written, it’s hard
to tell exactly what you're asking.

Note that https://tex.stackexchange.com/ exists.

Best
Martin



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Carrs
2018-04-30 08:10:31 UTC
Permalink
Thank you all,

this is all very helpful information with some good leads on where to go
next.

Chris
Post by Martin Schröder
Post by Wilfred van Rooijen
a newbie question. I would like advice on which TeX-based software it would
be best to learn in detail for my typesetting plans. So far, I have learned
a little TeX and a little LaTeX, but not enough of either to tell me which
will work best for me.
Please read https://www.tug.org/levels.html
Please clarify your specific problem or add additional details to
highlight exactly what you need. As it's currently written, it’s hard
to tell exactly what you're asking.
Note that https://tex.stackexchange.com/ exists.
Best
Martin
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Wilfred van Rooijen
2018-04-29 06:27:16 UTC
Permalink
What I was trying to explain was the following: even if the software supports UTF-8 / unicode, then that does not necessarily mean that it supports ("out of the box") all your typographical wishes and demands.
The OP was referring to several complicated typesetting tasks. My advice is: do not stare yourself blind on support for unicode alone. If you need several complicated typesetting tasks, check out the various classes, packages and tex-engine as a whole. Especially if you are using a more or less traditional alphabet and you do not need to use Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Ethiopian, Cambodian, Thai and Hindi in one document, you can just as well use the traditional versions of latex/

As far as up(La)TeX is concerned: yes, there is upLaTeX, which is the best Japanese language version of LaTeX as far as I am concerned, and which my students often use. I prefer LuaLaTeX because upLaTeX does not support PDF inclusion.

Wilfred
Post by Wilfred van Rooijen
Second, about unicode, my experiences are mixed. I use Japanese as my main language of communication. I found that "plain XeLaTeX" is not really adequate for Japanese as it lacks many common features; LuaLaTeX performs better, but still not as good as the pre-UTF-8 special "Japanese LaTeX" called "platex". In other words, even if XeLaTeX can typeset all unicode characters, you still need proper fonts, and special typesetting (such as indents, hyphenation rules, etc) may not be perfect.
  In yet other words, the features you miss are about Japanese
typesetting, not Unicode.  This is an important distinction since the
original poster doesn’t need to typeset Japanese.

  As a an aside, if you’re talking about pTeX you should really mention
its UTF-8 extension, upTeX.
Post by Wilfred van Rooijen
If you are looking for something which based on TeX but closer to DTP software, check out ConTeXt. ConTeXt has been used for many complex, professional typesetting jobs, and the developers are very active in trying to find new solutions if needed. IIRC the current version of ConTeXt supports at least LuaLaTeX which provides support for UTF-8
  The version that’s currently actively developed, Mark IV (mkiv) is
focused on LuaTeX, while the earlier version, Mark II, is more or less
frozen and supports pdfTeX and XeTeX.

    Best,

        Arthur
Mojca Miklavec
2018-05-01 06:40:51 UTC
Permalink
Post by Wilfred van Rooijen
Hi,
a newbie question. I would like advice on which TeX-based software it would
be best to learn in detail for my typesetting plans. So far, I have learned
a little TeX and a little LaTeX, but not enough of either to tell me which
will work best for me.
You can also look into ConTeXt.

It is based on TeX, so you get support for all the fancy math stuff
and typographical quality.

The basic syntax is not that much different from (La)TeX. Instead of
\begin{itemize} ... \end{itemize} you use \startitemize ...
\stopitemize for example, but syntax for math is mostly the same. The
internals/programming is cleaner in my opinion (but much different in
any case).

It works well on all platforms you need (Linux, Mac, Windows, but also
many others), like any other TeX flavour.

It works with both Unicode engines (LuaTeX and XeTeX, even though
ConTeXt's support for LuaTeX is much much more advanced nowadays). It
supports more scripts than just Latin script and can also
automatically compose characters for you even when some font of lower
quality is lacking those characters.

Its support for very different and very flexible styles is great and
very well integrated into the package. Support for multiple columns is
quite advanced and allows you to place pictures across multiple
columns and across multiple pages if needed.

It is of course completely free and opensources, no licences (that is
also true for nearly all TeX anyway). There are TeX user groups around
the globe (TUG in US, DANTE in Germary, as well as some others in
Poland, UK, France, Italy, Denmark, ... ConTeXt group as well) where
you can enrol as a member and support TeX development, but those are
optional.

Beginner manual is here:
http://distribution.contextgarden.net/current/context/current/doc/context/documents/general/manuals/ma-cb-en.pdf
along with a lot of other manuals. The only drawback is that there are
so many different document spread around that it's sometimes tricky to
figure out where to look unless you read them all.

You can also get face-to-face help at the meeting:
http://meeting.contextgarden.net
which is a great place to meet people, exchange ideas, learn about new
development, get your questions answered.

What I particularly like about ConTeXt is that:
- it is very actively developed
- it has a consistent user interface and no need to find a different
package for every feature you need in your document
- it has a very active mailing list and you can usually get your
questions answered very quickly
- new functionality is often added on user requests, sometimes within
a few hours
- it has a lot of amazing functionality with respect to new
technologies (like fonts) that not even the expensive commercial
products can offer
- built-in clean programming language (lua)
- ability to interface with external libraries (nearly built-in
support for reading from databases)

The only "drawback" of ConTeXt is that for historic reasons (ConTeXt
is younger) LaTeX has more users, so if a complete newbie seeks help
nearby (not online), it is slightly easier to find someone familiar
with LaTeX. But as soon as you have some specific needs like advanced
support for image placement and other trickery, the fact that your
neighbour has written a paper with LaTeX some time ago will usually
not help that much anyway.

Mojca


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Philip Taylor (RHUoL)
2018-05-01 06:57:54 UTC
Permalink
Post by Mojca Miklavec
It is of course completely free and opensources, no licences (that is
also true for nearly all TeX anyway).
No licence ?  It will never get into TeX Live then :-)
Post by Mojca Miklavec
Finally, we are often asked what licence to use for new work. To be
considered for inclusion on TeX Live, a package must use a free software
licence [...]
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Mojca Miklavec
2018-05-01 07:08:28 UTC
Permalink
Post by Mojca Miklavec
It is of course completely free and opensources, no licences (that is
also true for nearly all TeX anyway).
No licence ? It will never get into TeX Live then :-)
What I meant was no licencing fees of course :)
Still not sure if that's the correct expression.

That said, ConTeXt did in fact have some difficulties in the past,
like having all the documentation and some fonts removed from TeX Live
since they were not considered free enough. (Documentation used
commercial fonts and its sources were not available because the author
did not want to end up with weirdly typeset copies of documentation
floating around.)

Mojca


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Wilfred van Rooijen
2018-05-01 11:38:06 UTC
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Following Mojca's explanation, I feel I should switch to ConTeXt :-))
Wilfred
Post by Wilfred van Rooijen
Hi,
a newbie question. I would like advice on which TeX-based software it would
be best to learn in detail for my typesetting plans. So far, I have learned
a little TeX and a little LaTeX, but not enough of either to tell me which
will work best for me.
You can also look into ConTeXt.

It is based on TeX, so you get support for all the fancy math stuff
and typographical quality.

The basic syntax is not that much different from (La)TeX. Instead of
\begin{itemize} ... \end{itemize} you use \startitemize ...
\stopitemize for example, but syntax for math is mostly the same. The
internals/programming is cleaner in my opinion (but much different in
any case).

It works well on all platforms you need (Linux, Mac, Windows, but also
many others), like any other TeX flavour.

It works with both Unicode engines (LuaTeX and XeTeX, even though
ConTeXt's support for LuaTeX is much much more advanced nowadays). It
supports more scripts than just Latin script and can also
automatically compose characters for you even when some font of lower
quality is lacking those characters.

Its support for very different and very flexible styles is great and
very well integrated into the package. Support for multiple columns is
quite advanced and allows you to place pictures across multiple
columns and across multiple pages if needed.

It is of course completely free and opensources, no licences (that is
also true for nearly all TeX anyway). There are TeX user groups around
the globe (TUG in US, DANTE in Germary, as well as some others in
Poland, UK, France, Italy, Denmark, ... ConTeXt group as well) where
you can enrol as a member and support TeX development, but those are
optional.

Beginner manual is here:
    http://distribution.contextgarden.net/current/context/current/doc/context/documents/general/manuals/ma-cb-en.pdf
along with a lot of other manuals. The only drawback is that there are
so many different document spread around that it's sometimes tricky to
figure out where to look unless you read them all.

You can also get face-to-face help at the meeting:
    http://meeting.contextgarden.net
which is a great place to meet people, exchange ideas, learn about new
development, get your questions answered.

What I particularly like about ConTeXt is that:
- it is very actively developed
- it has a consistent user interface and no need to find a different
package for every feature you need in your document
- it has a very active mailing list and you can usually get your
questions answered very quickly
- new functionality is often added on user requests, sometimes within
a few hours
- it has a lot of amazing functionality with respect to new
technologies (like fonts) that not even the expensive commercial
products can offer
- built-in clean programming language (lua)
- ability to interface with external libraries (nearly built-in
support for reading from databases)

The only "drawback" of ConTeXt is that for historic reasons (ConTeXt
is younger) LaTeX has more users, so if a complete newbie seeks help
nearby (not online), it is slightly easier to find someone familiar
with LaTeX. But as soon as you have some specific needs like advanced
support for image placement and other trickery, the fact that your
neighbour has written a paper with LaTeX some time ago will usually
not help that much anyway.

Mojca


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r***@hccnet.nl
2018-05-01 13:39:27 UTC
Permalink
One other advantage is that Context works with xml quite smoothly, once you know how to set it up.

Robert
Post by Wilfred van Rooijen
Following Mojca's explanation, I feel I should switch to ConTeXt :-))
Wilfred
Post by Wilfred van Rooijen
Hi,
a newbie question. I would like advice on which TeX-based software it would
be best to learn in detail for my typesetting plans. So far, I have learned
a little TeX and a little LaTeX, but not enough of either to tell me which
will work best for me.
You can also look into ConTeXt.
It is based on TeX, so you get support for all the fancy math stuff
and typographical quality.
The basic syntax is not that much different from (La)TeX. Instead of
\begin{itemize} ... \end{itemize} you use \startitemize ...
\stopitemize for example, but syntax for math is mostly the same. The
internals/programming is cleaner in my opinion (but much different in
any case).
It works well on all platforms you need (Linux, Mac, Windows, but also
many others), like any other TeX flavour.
It works with both Unicode engines (LuaTeX and XeTeX, even though
ConTeXt's support for LuaTeX is much much more advanced nowadays). It
supports more scripts than just Latin script and can also
automatically compose characters for you even when some font of lower
quality is lacking those characters.
Its support for very different and very flexible styles is great and
very well integrated into the package. Support for multiple columns is
quite advanced and allows you to place pictures across multiple
columns and across multiple pages if needed.
It is of course completely free and opensources, no licences (that is
also true for nearly all TeX anyway). There are TeX user groups around
the globe (TUG in US, DANTE in Germary, as well as some others in
Poland, UK, France, Italy, Denmark, ... ConTeXt group as well) where
you can enrol as a member and support TeX development, but those are
optional.
http://distribution.contextgarden.net/current/context/current/doc/context/documents/general/manuals/ma-cb-en.pdf <http://distribution.contextgarden.net/current/context/current/doc/context/documents/general/manuals/ma-cb-en.pdf>
along with a lot of other manuals. The only drawback is that there are
so many different document spread around that it's sometimes tricky to
figure out where to look unless you read them all.
http://meeting.contextgarden.net <http://meeting.contextgarden.net/>
which is a great place to meet people, exchange ideas, learn about new
development, get your questions answered.
- it is very actively developed
- it has a consistent user interface and no need to find a different
package for every feature you need in your document
- it has a very active mailing list and you can usually get your
questions answered very quickly
- new functionality is often added on user requests, sometimes within
a few hours
- it has a lot of amazing functionality with respect to new
technologies (like fonts) that not even the expensive commercial
products can offer
- built-in clean programming language (lua)
- ability to interface with external libraries (nearly built-in
support for reading from databases)
The only "drawback" of ConTeXt is that for historic reasons (ConTeXt
is younger) LaTeX has more users, so if a complete newbie seeks help
nearby (not online), it is slightly easier to find someone familiar
with LaTeX. But as soon as you have some specific needs like advanced
support for image placement and other trickery, the fact that your
neighbour has written a paper with LaTeX some time ago will usually
not help that much anyway.
Mojca
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Philip Taylor
2018-05-01 15:22:00 UTC
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Zdenek Wagner
2018-05-01 15:40:52 UTC
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Post by r***@hccnet.nl
One other advantage is that Context works with xml quite smoothly, once
you know how to set it up.
So can plain XeTeX -- please see http://hellenic-institute.uk/
research/lpl/Greek-MSS/Catalogue/Eutypon/e31-a02.pdf (first published in *΀᜞
Ε᜔τυποΜ <http://www.eutypon.gr/eutypon/>).*
Philip Taylor
Yes, but you need a lot of macros. In addition, XML from Excel is really
simple, you are sure tnat the values of attributes are always enclosed by
quotes, never by apostrophes. I have an example how to parse XML in encTeX.
And I will never try to do it with a real-life XML of high complexity. On
the contrary, ConTeXt has an XML parser in its kernel.


Zdeněk Wagner
http://ttsm.icpf.cas.cz/team/wagner.shtml
http://icebearsoft.euweb.cz
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