In-reply-to: <CMM.0.91.0.804372102.beebe@plot79.math.utah.edu> from
 "Nelson H. F. Beebe" at Jun 28, 95 02:41:43 pm
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Date: Thu, 29 Jun 1995 14:23:46 +0200
From: Joachim Schrod <schrod@ITI.INFORMATIK.TH-DARMSTADT.DE>
Sender: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project <LATEX-L@VM.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE>
To: Multiple recipients of list LATEX-L <LATEX-L@VM.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE>
Subject: Re: (La)TeX is SGML?
Status: R

Nelson wrote:
>
> The already-existing translators from SGML to (La)TeX are not complete
> solutions, because (a) they are based on particular document type
> definitions (notably, HTML), NOT the general SGML grammar, and (b)
> they are not founded on a rigorous grammatical analysis, but rather on
> simple ad hoc pattern matching.  Thus, they can do a good bit of the
> job, but will never be completely reliable.
 
Then use different tools... :)
 
One important tool is SGMLSpl, that enables you to build
structure-controlled applications in Perl.
 
For those who don't like Perl, but are part of the Tcl train: CoST,
the Copenhagen SGML Tool allows to model SGML elements by [incr tcl]
classes and define style sheets by defining the traversal of the tree
of objects.
 
Both tools should be available from all larger SGML archives. (Erik
Naggum's in Oslo, Exeter, the one that I maintain.)
 
        Joachim
 
PS: It might be that you like the OO approach of CoST, but think that
CoST it's too slow (in a medium sized tranformation specs I once had
times of 4 secs per line on an RS/6000 430 :( ) and/or you don't want
to fight with Tcl's quoting rules. Then you might want to contact me
to get a pre-release of a Common Lisp (i.e., CLOS) based system that
implements a similar model like that of CoST. Btw, the system is
named STIL, for `SGML Transformations In Lisp'. It's big advantage
(compared to CoST) is Lisp, it's big disadvatage -- is Lisp. :) No,
seriously, no docs are available.
 
--
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Joachim Schrod                  Email: schrod@iti.informatik.th-darmstadt.de
THD SGML Archive, maintainer
ftp.th-darmstadt.de:/pub/text/sgml/