Message-Id: <199402100925.AA14103@mail.cs.tu-berlin.de>
Reply-To: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project <LATEX-L@DHDURZ1.BITNET>
Date:         Thu, 10 Feb 1994 10:24:00 +0100
From: Frank Poppe <POPPE@swov.nl>
Sender: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project <LATEX-L@DHDURZ1.BITNET>
To: Multiple recipients of list LATEX-L <LATEX-L@DHDURZ1.BITNET>
Subject:      keyed options lists (Was: RE: A philosophical....)
Status: R

David Carlisle says:

DC> > ... \documentclass[option=value]{article} ....
DC>
DC> key = value syntax is generally quite nice for optional arguments.
DC> However, I can only repeat the guiding principles of the upgrade to
DC> 2e, as stated in the original announcement:
DC>
DC>  * Unmodified version 2.09 document files can be processed with
DC>    LaTeX2e.
DC>
DC>  * All new features of LaTeX2e conform to the conventions of version
DC>    2.09, making it as easy as possible for current users to learn to
DC>    use them.
DC>
DC> key=value is definitely not a standard convention of 2.09.
DC>

I suggested a way out of this as reaction to the "new features"
discussion. I did not get any reaction so I fear something went wrong
with my mail. If this suggestion is a foolish one, please point it out
(people generally don't seem to hesitate pointing out the inadequateness
of reactions on this list..:-).

Anyway, I'd suggest
        \documentclass[[key1]value[key2]value]{article} ....
as well as
        \section[[mark]short[toc]longer]{full}

In both examples the syntax
        \documentclass[opt1,opt2]{article}
and
        \documentstyle{opt1,opt2]{article}
and
        \section[short]{full}
would remain valid, and could easily be distinguished by LaTeX, in the
same way the presence of an optional argument is found.

The syntax key=value is of course more natural, but is seems very
difficult to distinghuish that from the current syntax.
_____________________________________________________________________________
 Frank Poppe             <poppe@swov.nl>                tel:   +31 70 3209323
 Institute for Road Safety Research SWOV                fax:   +31 70 3201261
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