References: <m0wdxiT-000OVnC@dcarlisle.demon.co.uk>
            <199706251348.OAA22853@knott.elsevier.co.uk>
            <199706261043.LAA02841@fell.open.ac.uk>
            <199706261107.MAA24582@knott.elsevier.co.uk>
            <199706261209.NAA03028@fell.open.ac.uk>
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Reply-To: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project
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In-Reply-To:  <199706261209.NAA03028@fell.open.ac.uk>
Date:         Thu, 26 Jun 1997 13:29:21 +0100
From: Sebastian Rahtz <s.rahtz@ELSEVIER.CO.UK>
Sender: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project
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To: Multiple recipients of list LATEX-L
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Subject:      Re: what is a latex command
Status: R

 > As much as I care about any other large number of people doing things
 > with documents, yes.

well, the issue is how large does the group get for you to notice it

 > as you suggest, but if that is all we need then we should leave out
 > the TeX bit and just:
 >
 >   make an even better formatting engine
yes please pretty please. keep the TeX macro language for those who
like it as a means of communication, but disengage it from the
formatting engine.

oh hell now we are back full circle. and i have  a feeling Chris and I
are simply agreeing that
 a) the (La)TeX language in all its glory should be cut down for the
    communication subset (somehow!)
 b) work on formatting engines should be independent of TeX markup

which is a trite pair of conclusions,and proabbly the basis for NTS
anyway.

 > > algorithms for float placement....
 >
 > Oh please, yes please!  No one ever sent me one yet.

the chattering classes have one. it is `when it looks nice'

sebastian