Re: LaTeX / Metafont was Re: Arabic transliteration

On Saturday 16 November 2002 09:44 am, Christophe Grandsire wrote:
> En réponse à Peter Clark <peter-clark@...>:
> >         Yes and no; for some odd reason, it doesn't show correctly in
> > DVI format but
> > just fine in PS or PDF format.
>
> Sorry, but it doesn't work either in PS format :(( . I get the place for
> the vertical text OK, but they stay empty (at compilation, it says it
> doesn't manage to create the Mongolian fonts :(( ).
        Oops, sorry, I didn't mean to imply that this was for MonTeX--I don't know
how MonTeX works, since I don't have it on my computer, but the sample given
works just fine for Latin text. In any case, the point of the exercise was to
demonstrate that should a hypothetical conlanger wish to create a
hypothetical vertical script, all said hypothetical conlanger would have to
do is create the script as if it were written horizontally and then turn it.

> > Again, this doesn't work in DVI form, but exporting it to PS and viewing
> > it
> > with 'gv' looks just fine. Of course, I haven't quite figured out how to
> > make
> > the text flow exactly as I would like (top-bottom AND left-right, rather
> > than
> > top-bottom, right-left), but I'm sure there must be a way to do so.
>
> Is the TeX-XeT package compatible? If so, by combining rotation and
> right-to- left writing direction, you should manage what you want.
        I don't know, I've never tried bi-di support before. What I think would
happen, however, is that the text would run from bottom to top, left to
write...unless it was flipped the other way, (\begin{turn{90}) and then
written bi-di! That just might work!

> I really don't see what's convoluted in the METAFONT syntax. It looks
> pretty basic to me...
        So now we learn that the French are not only omnipresent, but omniscient as
well! :)

*snip tutorial for future perusal, thanks*

> Well, TeX is for text processing the equivalent of assembly for
> programming. It's powerful, but very low-level. LaTeX, as a group of macros
> for TeX (I know, it's a little more than that, but at the end LaTeX always
> uses TeX for the final compilation :)) ), is basically the equivalent of
> higher-level languages. Everybody uses them because somebody has already
> taken the step of making those macros and it would be stupid to reinvent
> the wheel each time you want to create a document or write a program, not
> because TeX is so difficult. METAFONT, unfortunately, doesn't have this set
> of macros (a job for anyone?).
        My point exactly. I've played with some low-level TeX, but wouldn't want to
do so on a regular basis. Higher-level abstractions, while less powerful,
allow for quicker design and prototyping. Lower-level work should be left
only for custom tweaks. Which, in fact, is why I like to use LyX as my main
interface for LaTeX--I can descend to LaTeX or even TeX levels when I need
to, but can stay at a higher level for the routine stuff that *should* be
taken care of automatically. Of course I can type in \textbf{Bold font here},
but it's simpler and quicker to just hit ^B.
        And I have heard rumors of macros for Metafont (is it Metapost?), but haven't
looked into it much.
        :Peter

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