From: cbbrowne@csi.uottawa.ca (Christopher Browne)
Subject: Re: Technical wordprocessors for ST
Organization: Dept. of Computer Science, University of Ottawa
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 92 06:20:10 GMT

In article <1992Nov19.043945.2832@alw.nih.gov> rvenable@helix.nih.gov (Richard M. Venable) writes:
>In article <1992Nov18.103345.9447@ccsun.strath.ac.uk> madmal@spd.eee.strathclyde.ac.uk (Malachy Devlin - SPD) writes:
>>
>>Hi,
>>
>>Can anyone recommend a good technical word processor for the ST. ie. one that
>>would allow me to enter (large messy) equations (easily)? and also have the
>>ability to generate table of contents, tables etc or am I asking to much?
>>(I suppose I would be looking for something like word for windows 2 for the PC)
>>( apoloyises for mentioning PC in this group :-) )
>
>Well, if you've got at least 10 Mb of disk space available, there's a working
>version of TeX called  CS-TeX4  on atari.archive.umich.edu, and some general
>intros to TeX itself.  It works fine on my 1040 ST, using a DeskJet printer.
>Be sure to use the shell, and the English (as opposed to German) version.

I STRONGLY agree with this choice.  CS-TeX is a superb implementation
of TeX for the Atari.  Typical users will probably want to use the set
of LaTeX macros that are included that make it easier to describe
documents.

LaTeX does a very nice table of contents; when combined with the
(included with CS-TeX) BibTeX program, it has a virtually unrivaled
bibliography referencing system.  (Unix Refer which links to troff
being the one possible competitor.)

It does gory math very well, and if LaTeX doesn't do it the way you
want it to, (something that happened to me a few times in the
production of my soon-to-be-completed thesis) you can drop down to the
"nuts and bolts" TeX level.

Tables?  Does 'em quite well.  Some of what you type in looks like
gibberish, but it sure looks good on the page.  And it's mostly a
fairly simple set of rules for tables.

>Well, I also understand there's a version of Word Perfect for the ST
>line, but I can't vouch for it.

It wasn't until WP version 5.1 that they had "real math."  It's
important to note that 5.1 has never been released for the Atari.  I
think the "latest" Atari version is the somewhat orphaned 4.2.

By the way, Word Perfect pays the highest compliment possible to TeX -
the "equation environment" that they use to draw up mathematical
equations uses commands that are uncannily similar to those in TeX.
(Am I glad it's my office-mate doing equations in WP; I don't think
I'd have the patience for it...)

At the risk of mentioning the P* word, there are good PD
implementations for TeX and LaTeX on virtually any modern personal
computer.
Notables:

Atari:  CS-TeX
Amiga:  PasTeX
I*M:    emTeX
M*c:    ozTeX (?)

It's quite readily available in source form, and runs remarkably well
on almost anything that is associated with a variant of UNIX.  There
are also versions for VM/CMS and VMS, but I'd rather not talk about
them.

For more information, hang around Comp.text.tex.  The FAQ list is
periodically posted, and may even be longer than the Comp.sys.atari.st
FAQ.  Which means that it's extensive, and well written, of course
:-).

-- 
Christopher Browne                |     PGP 2.0 key available
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