From: sens@acfcluster.nyu.edu
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
Subject: Re: Tex Advantages (was Re: TeX an archaic religion?)
Date: 29 Aug 92 03:00:05 GMT
Organization: New York University

In article <1992Aug28.160629.17181@sjsumcs.sjsu.edu>, rick@sjsumcs.sjsu.edu (Richard Warner) writes:
> hpw@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (Harry P Warren) writes:

[I have edited out the other reader's response to your post, hope you won't
mind.]

>>| This is a fallacy.  There are a lot of site, platform, and implementation
>>| dependencies in TeX.  Each site has its macros (that they always forget to
>>| send with the document), each platform has something different in its flavor,
>>| and TeX ne LaTeX ne AMSTeX.  Then there is the horror of device
>>| dependencies.
>>|

Your assertion about site- and device-dependence is not true.  Very few people
write their own macro packages.  They use commonly available packages like
plain TeX, LaTeX, AMS-TeX, etc.  Have you ever seen a Harvard Plain package? 
On our VAX cluster, I see one style file called "nyuletter" which prints the
NYU logo on a letterhead, a style file that would be of very little use outside
NYU.  Most universities also have macros to format Ph.D. theses according to    
their guidelines: again, something which is not very useful elsewhere.  This is 
typically the extent of your alleged site dependence.
 
>>| >* TeX is free.
>>| 
>>| Not on your life.  TeX is very expensive - the costs are just more hidden
>>| than in the commercial products. 
>>| 
>  
> OK.  Take your TeX output.  Print it on an HP LaserJet, a QMS 810,
> a Sun SPARC printer and a Varityper 600.  How many different font sets
> would this require?  Three (3) - 300 dpi, 400 dpi, and 600 dpi!  You
> do not consider that device dependence?  How many would FrameMaker
> or PageMaker require?  One!  And thrown in with that one font I can also
> output to a 35mm slidemaker at 2K, 4K, or 8K resolution and imagesetters
> at 1200-2500 dpi (neither of which work very well with TeX).  Device
> independence, that is the name of the modern typesetting paradigm.
> TeX is extremely device dependent - it belongs to a previous typesetting 
> paradigm (bit-mapped page description versus the more current object-mapped
> page description).

  The same goes for your points about printing to various printers.  You just
need the appropriate device driver, just as in other program.  In this case,
you need a program called dvips to print to the postscript printers you
mentioned.  In fact, you just need dvips to convert the dvi (stands for DEVICE
INDEPENDENT) file produced by TeX to a .ps file, and you can print it to any
postscript printer.  Dvips even supports the built in fonts of the printer, or
any Adobe type 1 fonts.  It can even generate the necessary bitmapped fonts
through METAFONT, so you don't need to keep all the megabytes of bitmapped
fonts on your hard disk.

> TeX also eats a lot of disk space.  Disk space is expensive ($2.2 - 4/Mb
> low end, higher in proprietary systems).  TeX on UNIX systems with 1 font
> set (1 device type) takes over 20 Mb - that is $50-80 worth of disk space.

By the way, how much space does TeX really need?  I have installed emTeX,      
METAFONT and a lot of macros on my pc.  It still takes about 10 megabytes.    
I generate the fonts on the fly, if I installed all the bitmapped fonts it      
would have taken another 5-6 megabytes.  All the high end Windows word          
processors and DTP programs usually take about 15--20 megabytes of space.
 
> TeX also requires, at most sites, a great deal of support - and there is
> no OFFICIAL TeX support.  That means the site has to pay a body to
> baby-sit TeX.  That is expensive.  Very expensive.  That is why more
> and more University's are adopting a 'use TeX if you want, but we will
> not provide ANY support' attitude (I have seen 3 such announcements this
> week - and I see very few policy statements from other University's).
> They have discovered that the cost of supporting TeX is much higher than
> any commercial software; and budgets are lean.

 TeX has no "official", i.e., telephone, support.  Neither has Emacs, GCC,
Ghostscript, X-Windows, ...  What is your suggestion regarding these other
softwares?
 
> As I have said privately to several individuals - I am not pushing anyone
> away from TeX or towards any commercial package.  But TeX, like Forth
> and APL and a few other things, has become a 'religion' that the true
> believers think is great. They then try to collect converts to their faith.
> The problem I have is with the mis-information that is spread in this
> conversion campaign - like the 'device independence' fallacy.  If you
> want to follow your 'religion' fine - but please keep to the facts.
> 

From your various postings, for example the bit about what kind of fonts are
needed to print TeX output to different printers in the latest message, it
seems you don't know too much about TeX either.  One could also take issue with
your view that WYSIWYG programs are somehow more "modern" and markup language
based programs like TeX are "obsolete".  A structured document preparing tool
like LaTeX makes more intelligent use of your computer.  You, the user, can
concentrate on writing the document and let the computer work out the details  
about formatting, inter word spacing, etc.  A WYSIWYG program is not much
better than an automated typewriter.  You can produce very nice output with
Frame, but it is a lot of work and you need to have sound ideas about design
and typography.  Before you air your paranoia about TeX in public, please make 
the effort to understand the issues involved.

-- 


Sunando Sen 

Department of Economics                Telephone:(212) 998-8960
New York University                    Internet: sens@acfcluster.nyu.edu
269 Mercer Street, 7th Floor           Bitnet:   sens@nyuacf
New York, NY 10003