Re: LaTeX / Metafont was Re: Arabic transliteration

On Friday 15 November 2002 04:10 pm, Christophe Grandsire wrote:
> En réponse à Peter Clark <peter-clark@...>:
> But once compiled, will the DVI show vertical text? The only package I see
> on my installation with vertical text abilities is MonTeX, and it's far
> from complete...
        Yes and no; for some odd reason, it doesn't show correctly in DVI format but
just fine in PS or PDF format. The trick is simple; just use the following
(not full LaTeX format, which is left to the imaginative reader, merely the
good bits):
...
\usepackage{rotating}
...
Some text here
...
\begin{turn}{-90} \begin{minipage}{5cm} ... Long text here ... \end{minipage}
\end{turn}
...
etc.

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.

> >         Comforting. The last time I did Cartesian geometry was eight
> > years ago.
>
> Easy to take up again. Do you play chess or checkers? Do you know at least
> what a board of chess is? Then you know Cartesian geometry :)) . The rest
> of Cartesian geometry is pure paraphrase on that.
        Hmph. I spent half the day today trying to piece together some idea of how it
works, and came to the conclusion that I'm going to need a rather in-depth
tutorial to explain all this convoluted syntax. You can certain tell that
Knuth was influenced by Algol. If someone could point me in the direction of
a good tutorial ("Here's how to make a vertical line. Here's how to cross the
line and make a 'T'. Here's how to shorten the second line and add a third at
the middle to make an 'F'...) that would probably help immensely.

> > (Hmm--second time Descartes has been mentioned on this list in a
> > week--distrubing...)
>
> LOL. Yep, this man is never very far. Trust the French to be omnipresent
> ;)))) .
        That's very disturbing...

> >         I read the book and went, "Huh?" I'm more the type that learns
> > from
> > example
>
> The METAFONT Book is also a tutorial (it contains a lot of examples and
> exercises, which I consider quite well done. Knuth is one of those authors
> who actually try to make things easy for their readers).
        Which is of course why everybody uses TeX and doesn't dream of using LaTeX,
right? :P

> > Is it the same as the one at
> > http://www.math.uni-hamburg.de/home/ammann/tex/tetex/doc/knuth/mfbook.dvi
> >?
>
> Yep, except that I have the figures too :)) (OK, in a separate file, but
> it's better than nothing :)) ).
        Well, if it won't bomb my inbox, I wouldn't mind the DVI with the figures.
Although I have to wonder why they aren't together--seems a little odd to
typeset and illustrate a book separately...

> >         Hmm--maybe we should start a separate mailing list: "LaTeX and
> > Friends for
> > Conlangers." Let's see, H.S. Teoh has also been threatening to create a
> > MF
> > font, anybody else?
>
> I'm threatening to create a MF font for Maggel (as well as a TTF and
> Postcript font afterwards :)) ). It may be a good idea to make a separate
> list of LaTeX for conlangers, as the technical discussions on (La)TeX are
> probably boring for half (and I'm quite optimistic there ;)) ) the people
> on Conlang...
        Well, at least I change the subject heading to indicate what the message is
really about. :) Unlike, say, some 17th century French philosophers who
hijack KuJomu threads... ;>
        :Peter

Reply