Received: from mail.proteosys.com ([213.139.130.197]) by nummer-3.proteosys with Microsoft SMTPSVC(5.0.2195.5329); Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:13:58 +0200 Received: by mail.proteosys.com (8.12.9/8.12.2) with ESMTP id h6H9DocH031019 for ; Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:13:56 +0200 Received: from listserv.uni-heidelberg.de (listserv.uni-heidelberg.de [129.206.100.27]) by relay2.uni-heidelberg.de (8.12.9/8.12.9) with ESMTP id h6H97sGl026261; Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:07:54 +0200 (MET DST) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----_=_NextPart_001_01C34C43.C0F04F00" Received: from listserv (listserv.uni-heidelberg.de [129.206.100.27]) by listserv.uni-heidelberg.de (8.12.3/8.12.3/SuSE Linux 0.6) with ESMTP id h6GM0ATB028243; Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:06:50 +0200 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft Exchange V6.5 Received: from LISTSERV.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE by LISTSERV.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE (LISTSERV-TCP/IP release 1.8d) with spool id 1396 for LATEX-L@LISTSERV.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE; Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:06:50 +0200 Received: from relay.uni-heidelberg.de (relay.uni-heidelberg.de [129.206.100.212]) by listserv.uni-heidelberg.de (8.12.3/8.12.3/SuSE Linux 0.6) with ESMTP id h6H96oM9000412 for ; Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:06:50 +0200 Received: from mail.npc.de (fw.npc.de [62.225.140.214]) by relay.uni-heidelberg.de (8.12.9/8.12.9) with ESMTP id h6H97Emp008748 for ; Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:07:14 +0200 (MET DST) Received: by mail.npc.de (Postfix, from userid 1014) id 737591543; Thu, 17 Jul 2003 11:07:12 +0200 (CEST) In-Reply-To: References: <20030710081528.A12401@diabolo.informatik.rwth-aachen.de> <78ADDA01-B2DC-11D7-8AE7-0050E4455404@atlis.com> <20030711081704.A14039@diabolo.informatik.rwth-aachen.de> <16146.60345.852158.31606@pussy.npc.de> Return-Path: X-Mailer: VM 7.04 under 21.4 (patch 8) "Honest Recruiter" XEmacs Lucid X-OriginalArrivalTime: 17 Jul 2003 09:13:59.0917 (UTC) FILETIME=[C214D1D0:01C34C43] X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.28 (www . roaringpenguin . com / mimedefang) X-Spam-Score: -26.4 () EMAIL_ATTRIBUTION,IN_REP_TO,QUOTED_EMAIL_TEXT,REFERENCES,REPLY_WITH_QUOTES Content-class: urn:content-classes:message Subject: Re: XML, UTF-8 and TeX engines Was (Re: OT: ANT) Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2003 10:07:12 +0100 Message-ID: A<16150.26432.179873.408825@pussy.npc.de> X-MS-Has-Attach: X-MS-TNEF-Correlator: Thread-Topic: Re: XML, UTF-8 and TeX engines Was (Re: OT: ANT) Thread-Index: AcNMQ8IrqGdZh9GHSq6kPOS1gcL2yg== From: "Joachim Schrod" To: Reply-To: "Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project" Status: R X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 4682 This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------_=_NextPart_001_01C34C43.C0F04F00 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable >>>>> "WH" =3D=3D William F Hammond writes: WH> Joachim Schrod writes: >> But not necessarily the most interesting. There is also the >> possibility of experimenting with new innovative approaches to style >> sheets, given by modular XML processors like PXP and modular >> typesetting engines like ant. WH> James Clark once wrote somewhere that style sheet processing is a WH> limited form of sgml processing, and I've never had reason to doubt = it WH> for author-side processing. Don't underestimate the power of less WH> restrained frameworks like David Megginson's perl module SGMLS.pm = (and WH> its friendly interface sgmlspl.pl) for formatting XML to LaTeX. As much as I respect James, I can only agree with him here on a very very abstract level. With "style sheets" above I didn't mean transforming XML to other markup languages, I meant *directly* typesetting XML documents, with a *very* high quality, and including all necessary intermediate steps (insertions -- figures, tables, footnotes, endnotes, marginal note; table of contents/figures/etc., cross references, complex counting schemes, bibliography, index processing, etc: just look at all LaTeX packages or Context modules). We don't have this today. FOP, the XML style sheet communities answer to the task, is not up to that demand; its capabilities are not enough. For imperative programming languages like SGMLS.pm and their ilk, no typesetting engine is available. XSLT is a write-only language when it comes to implementing the "intermediate steps" above, that's no improvement to TeX macro programming. It has poor semantics (like TeX, it's even missing elementary boolean clauses), and its syntax is horrible to read and thus maintenance is hard. Hopefully, development on the style sheet front has not stopped here and will continue after the XML hype is gone. Cheers, Joachim -- =3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D= -=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-= =3D Joachim Schrod Email: jschrod@acm.org Roedermark, Germany ``How do we persuade new users that spreading fonts across the = page like peanut butter across hot toast is not necessarily the route = to typographic excellence?'' -- Peter Flynn ------_=_NextPart_001_01C34C43.C0F04F00 Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Re: XML, UTF-8 and TeX engines Was (Re: OT: ANT)

>>>>> "WH" =3D=3D William F = Hammond <William> writes:

WH> Joachim Schrod <jschrod@ACM.ORG> = writes:
>> But not necessarily the most interesting. = There is also the
>> possibility of experimenting with new = innovative approaches to style
>> sheets, given by modular XML processors like = PXP and modular
>> typesetting engines like ant.

WH> James Clark once wrote somewhere that style = sheet processing is a
WH> limited form of sgml processing, and I've = never had reason to doubt it
WH> for author-side processing.  Don't = underestimate the power of less
WH> restrained frameworks like David Megginson's = perl module SGMLS.pm (and
WH> its friendly interface sgmlspl.pl) for = formatting XML to LaTeX.

As much as I respect James, I can only agree with him = here on a very
very abstract level. With "style sheets" = above I didn't mean
transforming XML to other markup languages, I meant = *directly*
typesetting XML documents, with a *very* high = quality, and including
all necessary intermediate steps (insertions -- = figures, tables,
footnotes, endnotes, marginal note; table of = contents/figures/etc.,
cross references, complex counting schemes, = bibliography, index
processing, etc: just look at all LaTeX packages or = Context modules).
We don't have this today.

FOP, the XML style sheet communities answer to the = task, is not up to
that demand; its capabilities are not enough. For = imperative
programming languages like SGMLS.pm and their ilk, no = typesetting
engine is available. XSLT is a write-only language = when it comes to
implementing the "intermediate steps" = above, that's no improvement to
TeX macro programming. It has poor semantics (like = TeX, it's even
missing elementary boolean clauses), and its syntax = is horrible to
read and thus maintenance is hard. Hopefully, = development on the style
sheet front has not stopped here and will continue = after the XML hype
is gone.

Cheers,
        = Joachim

--
=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-= =3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D-=3D= -=3D-=3D-=3D
Joachim = Schrod           &= nbsp;           &n= bsp;          Email: = jschrod@acm.org
Roedermark, Germany

        ``How do we = persuade new users that spreading fonts across the page
        like = peanut butter across hot toast is not necessarily the route to
        = typographic = excellence?''          =              = -- Peter Flynn

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