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author | Norbert Preining <norbert@preining.info> | 2019-09-02 13:46:59 +0900 |
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committer | Norbert Preining <norbert@preining.info> | 2019-09-02 13:46:59 +0900 |
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diff --git a/usergrps/uktug/baskervi/5_4/goossens.tex b/usergrps/uktug/baskervi/5_4/goossens.tex new file mode 100644 index 0000000000..410600fca9 --- /dev/null +++ b/usergrps/uktug/baskervi/5_4/goossens.tex @@ -0,0 +1,592 @@ +\newcommand{\Lcs}[1]{{\ttfamily\char'134#1}} +\providecommand{\PS}{PostScript} +\def\MP{MetaPost} +\providecommand{\PDF}{PDF} +\title{TUG95 at St. Petersburg Beach, Florida} +\author[Michel Goossens]{Michel Goossens\\\emph{Email: } + \texttt{m.goossens@cern.ch}} +\begin{Article} +[\emph{Editor's note:} Michel has kindly allowed us to print portions +of his longer report on TUG 95, which will be distributed on the +Internet.] + +\section{Monday July 24th} + +Monday morning saw the official opening of the Conference, with TUG95 +Organizing Committee Chairperson Mimi Burbank welcoming all +participants before passing the floor on to Michel Goossens, who +thanked everybody for coming, and emphasized the different +structure of this conference as compared to previous years, since this +time we had more workshop oriented sessions (in the afternoons) and +were opening up the area of presentations to the world of electronic +publishing at large, and SGML/HTML, Adobe Acrobat, CD-ROMs, hypertext, +etc.\ in particular. At that point the representatives of +NTG said a few words about their third edition of the 4All\TeX{} +CD-ROM, and Wietse Dol took this occasion to offer the first pressed +CD to Donald Knuth who was a guest of honour at this 16th +($2^{2^{2}}$) \TeX{} Annual Meeting. + +The first talk was by Ji\v{r}\'{\i} Zlatu\v{s}ka, who showed how \MF{} and +\TeX{} can work together to typeset combinations of text and graphics. +His new approach based on \TeX's extended ligature mechanism, reduces +the number of \MF{} passes to one, and also simplifies the +\TeX-\MF{} interface. This permits easier typesetting of text +along curves and in particular allows one to generate beautiful +institutional seals and logos in various forms and combinations +starting from the same base elements. He noted that, although \PS{} +is often the first choice for including graphics information in \TeX{} +documents, \MF{} often offers improved legibility of the +logos and the letters at smaller sizes. + +The next speaker, Richard Kinch, discussed his work on building +reliable \PS{} Type1 and Truetype outlines for the Computer Modern +fonts. He emphasized that several \MF{} primitives (stroked pens, +overlapping ink) have no equivalent in these formats, since they +support only non-overlapping B\'ezier curves. His program, +\texttt{MetaFog}, handles most of the difficult problems associated +with these conversions. He went on to discuss how \texttt{MetaFog} works, +pointing out some of its drawbacks and making a plea for including +hints inside the \MF{} sources. He finally compared his results to +other outline instances of the CM fonts. + +After refreshments Alan Hoenig gave another one of his almost +``perfect'' pedagogical talks, this time showing how one can use +Adobe's Poetica font set, comprising 21 fonts in two families, +exploiting the possibilities of the virtual font mechanism. Alan +showed us how his macro package together with the font metrics +generated by Alan Jeffrey's \texttt{fontinst} package are able to +typeset a sonnet by Shakespeare as though it were written in the most +beautiful calligraphy of a scribe. + +One can never exaggerate the importance of documentation, and to teach +first-year students the benefits of that approach an experiment was +started at Texas' A\&M University by teaching Knuth's \texttt{WEB} +system, that fully exploits combining code and documentation in the +same source. It was found that students who had to ``mix'' program +description and code acquired increased problem solving skills. They +tended to analyse their problems not merely in function of the +programming language used, but in terms of the more general literate +programming paradigm. Thanks to this increased awareness the students +who took the \texttt{WEB} course also were more successful in grasping +data structures and program development in general. + +The morning session was concluded by W{\l}odek Bzyl who showed how by +extending Nowman Ramsey's generic literate tool \texttt{noweb} with a +few stand-alone front-end programs, it became relatively easy to +create a \texttt{\TeX-WEB} system that is easy to understand for the +novice user. The system is extensible by allowing customized styles +and additional features. As an example he showed the literate source +of \texttt{plain.tex}, the \TeX{} source of Knuth's \texttt{plain} +format, and proudly handed a printed copy to Donald Knuth, who browsed +through it with great interest. + +After lunch Sebastian Rahtz discussed some advanced exotic features +of Timothy van Zandt's \texttt{PSTricks} package, that provides an +easy interface between the PostScript and \TeX{} languages +(\texttt{PSTricks}'s operating principles were described at +TUG94---see \TUB\ 15(3), pp.\ 239--246). The talk was a shortened +version of a three-hour presentation by Denis Girou, a well-known +\texttt{PSTricks} guru, at the GUTenberg meeting on June 1st in +Montpellier (France). By using the electronic version of the slides, +Sebastian could easily zoom in on fractions of text and drawings. +Fractals, complicated curves, like cycloids (this is the first time +that curves of this type published in books on calculus will +actually be drawn correctly, Don Knuth remarked when seeing the +beautiful and precise graphs), and three dimensional multi-colour +calendars were only of few of the graphics gems possible by this +approach. + +Jerry Marsden introduced his \texttt{FAS\TeX} system, a library of +standardized system-independent shortcuts for \TeX{} commands. At +present versions for Mac and Unix exist. This approach speeds up the +keying of input material and greatly increases the accuracy of the +final text. Abbreviations exist for most of the well know formats +and extensions, like the AMS packages. Commands can easily be edited +or added. This approach is especially interesting in an environment +where many non-specialist typists have to work together so that +consistency and ease of input are important considerations. + +After tea Denis Kletzing showed how he uses his \texttt{multienumerate} +package to handle complicated list structures. This environment +handles narrow numbered list entries by bundling them in multiple +columns. The drawback of the approach is that the user must specify +the actual layout by typing the explicit position of the entry via +different \Lcs{mitem\emph{ijk}} commands, where \texttt{\emph{ijk}} +are column identifiers. With a little more \TeX{} programming a lot of +the positioning can probably be made automatic, but the approach shows +that it is relatively straightforward to extend \LaTeX{} to cope with +moderately simple but useful structures. + +Jon Stenerson described the experience gained by using the style files +he developed for use with \emph{Scientific Word} and which he +described last year at TUG94 (\TUB\ 15(3), pp.\ 247--254). He thought +that the basic ideas of his original approach were still all right but +that most of them will have to be rewritten for streamlining and to +better reflect his present thoughts on the subject. + +At the end of the day the editors of the journals edited by the +various \TeX{} User Groups gave an overview of the problems +encountered and ways of improving communication and mutual +re-publication of worthwhile material. A few weeks before the +conference, an electronic discussion list coordinated by Christina +Thiele (TUG and former editor of \emph{TTN}) and Gerard van Nes (NTG, editor +of \emph{MAPS}) had been set up and allowed the editors to exchange valuable +information. Presentations were made by Sebastian Rahtz (editor of +the \ukt's \BV), Michel Goossens (for Jacques Andr\'e, editor +of GUTenberg's \emph{Cahiers GUT\-en\-berg} and \emph{Lettre + GUT\-en\-berg}), Christina Thiele (previous editor of TUG's \emph{TTN}), +Luzia Dietsche (editor of \textsc{Dante}'s \emph{Die \TeX{}nische Kom\"odie}), +Gerard van Nes (editor of NTG's \emph{MAPS}), Wietse Dol (editor of +the Euro\TeX95 Proceedings), Barbara Beeton (editor of \TUB), and +W{\l}odek Bzyl (editor of GUST's magazine). From the various talks it +became soon evident that most of the encountered problems were common +to most user groups' publications, with in particular often an extreme +dependence on a single individual so that when s/he is unavailable +the whole production process suffers. It was clear that a production +team of a few individuals is the only way out of this situation to +ensure that issues can be produced at more or less regular intervals. +Other themes were the difficulty of finding authors, and volunteers to +proofread, correct and edit the articles. All in all, editing a +journal is a non-trivial task and involves the dedication and hard +work of a lot of individuals. As Jacques Andr\'e summed it all up: +``An editor is like an organists at Sunday mass: if the music is good, +no one hears it; if it is bad, everyone cries.'' At the end of the +session Gerard distributed \emph{MAPS} awards to Christina Thiele for her +many years as \emph{TTN} editor and to Mimi Burbank for her hard work +organizing the TUG95 Conference. + +\section{Tuesday July 25th} + +As Donald Knuth only rarely attends TUG conferences these days +it was a real pleasure to have him with us at TUG95 and we gave him +the floor for the first part of the morning. After answering the +``usual'' first question---``when is volume four of \emph{The Art of + Computer Programming} coming out?'' (it will be published over several +years with about 200 pages coming out every six months or so)---he +talked at length about \TeX{} and how he would do it in basically the +same way if he were to start over today. A more detailed account of +Knuth's presentation will be published elseware based on notes taken +by Christina Thiele. + +After the break John Hobby, the author of \MP{}, gave a live +demonstration of his program which is now used by Knuth himself to +prepare the graphical material of his books. \MP{} implements a +picture-drawing language based on Knuth's \MF{}, but it outputs \PS{} +commands instead. It moreover gives access to all features of \PS{} +and allows easy inclusion of text and graphics (for more details on +\MP{} see the user guide available on CTAN or an introductory article +in the Euro\TeX92 Proceedings, pp.\ 21--36, Prague, Sep.\ 1992). + +The last set of presentations were about ``future systems''. First +Robin Fairbairns gave an introduction to Unicode. He reviewed the +winding road from 6-bit propriety codes for encoding information on +computers, to 7-bit ASCII-like codes, then to 8-bit EBCDIC and ISO +standards 8859-xx, specific language encodings, the 16-bit East-Asian +JIS, GB, KS and Big Five codes, to Unicode and 32-bit ISO 10646 (for a +detailed discussion of questions of encoding and multi-linguism see, +e.g., \emph{Cahiers GUTenberg} 20, pp.1--53). It is to be noted that Unicode +is the internal encoding used by Haralambous and Plaice's $\Omega$ +program, a 16-bit extension of \TeX{} (\TUB\ 15(3), pp.\ 320--324 and +344--352). Ji\v{r}\'{\i} Zlatu\v{s}ka then brought us up-to-date on +the \etex{} project, whose first version had just been distributed to +developers. Peter Breitenlohner complemented Ji\v{r}\'{\i}'s talk with +some more technical details on \etex{}. It all sounds like an +interesting development. + +During the first part of the afternoon Wietse Dol showed how easy it +is to use the ``plug-and-play'' 4all\TeX{} CD-system for PC's. An +interactive live presentation showed the ease with which the system +can be installed from the CD, and also how applications can be run. + +\section{Wednesday July 26th} + +Mark Swift was the first speaker of the day and in his talk +\emph{Modularity in \LaTeX} he explained that \LaTeX{} should be built +in a highly modular way. In particular an abstraction of functional +modules not mapped onto filenames would be an important point, as +shown by recent discussions on the \texttt{LATEX3} discussion list +where the ``forced'' uniqueness of filenames in the basic \LaTeX{} +distribution, like \texttt{article.cls}, was questioned. The speaker +proposed some possible extensions to \TeX{} and discussed his work on +the \texttt{frankenstein} package, which adds certain kinds of +modularity to \LaTeX. + +Bart Wage of Elsevier Science in Amsterdam gave an interesting +description of how journals are handled from source copy to +printed/electronic document. Text is converted into SGML, figures are +kept in various formats (e.g., TIFF, JPEG) and \LaTeX{} sources are +also translated into SGML using the Elsevier DTD. \LaTeX{} allows for +easy typesetting, but it has no formal DTD, making extensive tagging +somewhat difficult, while SGML allows for a formal DTD, where explicit +tagging of all document elements with respect to that DTD is possible. +Formal specifications exist for math, tables, bibliographic material, +etc.. Elsevier see SGML as an ideal exchange format between different +source representations. All documents are translated into SGML and +stored in the ``Warehouse'', which forms the common repository for the +various further uses of the documents. This is extremely important +for electronic documents, where re-use and structure-awareness are of +prime importance. Bart emphasized that a journal is not just a +collection of articles, but a real web of cross-links to related +topics and references, and the future of publishing lies in the +optimization of these facilities for all potential users. + +Pierre Mackay then read a paper on \emph{Modern Catalan Typographical + Conventions} written by Gabriel Valiente Feruglio, who could not +attend. It was an interesting journey in search of typographic rules +for scientific Catalan texts. The author complained that no normative +typographical conventions existed for his language and then went on to +propose a set based on his study of several reference texts. Finally +he introduced a set of possible \TeX{} definitions implementing these +rules. + +After coffee Petr Sojka gave one of the best technical papers of +TUG95---Petr got the ``Knuth'' prize of the Conference for discussing +something important that Knuth did not think about when developing +\TeX---a follow-up of his detailed paper describing the problems +of hyphenation with \TeX{} presented at in Gdansk in September 1994 +(Euro\TeX94 Proceedings pp.\ 59--68). This time he discussed the +problems of hyphenating long compound words, which occur very often in +German, Dutch, and the Slavic languages, since in these languages the +constituent parts are not signalled by a hyphen or other fill +character. This makes it often difficult, if not impossible, to +hyphenate words correctly. Therefore Petr suggests extensions to the +hyphenation algorithms of \TeX{} to successfully treat such cases +and he discussed in a generic way which basic functionalities +would be needed. Perhaps something to be implemented in (one of) the +``successor(s)-to-\TeX'', he commented (and Don seemed to agree). + +The last talk of the morning was by Sebastian Rahtz, who discussed +the translation of \LaTeX{} sources into SGML. His +presentation was a complement to Bart Wage's earlier that +morning. After working on the conversion problem for several months, +Sebastian came to the conclusion that the only foolproof way is to use +\TeX{} itself to output SGML, a solution implemented by ICPC in Dublin. +He is actually using an intermediate approach, (pioneered by +Sebastian and myself at CERN), which +translates most \LaTeX{} commands into SGML by redefinition of macros, +and then extracts the text from the dvi file. This system +copes with almost all \LaTeX{} commands (including math). + +The afternoon had presentations by convenors of various working +groups. First Norman Walsh presented the work of the \texttt{tds} +(\TeX{} Directory Structure) working group. He explained the rationale +of the choices that have been made, emphasizing that one of the basic +constraints had been ISO-9660, which (only) allows for directories +eight deep and limited to ``8+3'' case-insensitive names for files +(for DOS users this will sound as a blessing, I am sure). Since not +all \TeX{} engines support an optimized recursive directory search +major attention was paid to propose an efficient structure that +minimizes losses of efficiency while searching for package and +font-related files by \TeX. It was emphasized that a production +run-time directory structure, like \texttt{tds} is different in nature +to an archive, like CTAN, and that the two cannot be married easily. + +Tomas Rokicki and Michael Sofka then discussed the work in the +dvi-standard committee, especially the standardization of the various +\Lcs{special} commands, that had been discussed by an extremely active +interested group of implementors, meeting over several of ``working +breakfasts and lunches''. I think that real progress was made in this +area where a normative syntax had been awaited for too long. I am +very grateful for the enthusiasm shown by these people, and am +convinced that we shall see their work bear fruit in the near future +(Tom told he will be working actively on his program \texttt{dvips} +over the next few months, so that we can be sure, knowing Tom's +reputation, that many of the hyper- and other goodies discussed during +the conference, will become part of this, and other popular +dvi-drivers). + +After the refreshment break T.~V.~Raman gave a practical demonstration +of his ASTER system, which allows one to ``hear'' \LaTeX{} sources, +including mathematical formulas, being read out. His system uses a +speech synthesizer via an augmented emacs editor running with Common +Lisp, and is able to analyse, decode and then transcribe into +audible form well-structured \LaTeX{} documents. This last remark is +extremely important, since, as already pointed out by Sebastian Rahtz +in his talk earlier that day, due to the various (ambiguous) ways that +mathematics can be coded in \TeX{}, there exists no automatic way to +parse such \TeX{} source into something usable more generally, such as +SGML or audible sound. This was the loudest plea yet for using +well-structured markup. + +Just preceding the Conference dinner the editors of the various +\TeX-related magazines had a second meeting to discuss ways of +improving communication. It was decided to write a short overview of +the experiences of each team for \emph{TTN}, to provide cross-references to +each other's publications on the user groups' respective WWW pages, +where tables of contents of the magazines will be posted (in fact, +GUT\-enberg already decided to make freely available on the Internet +via WWW, all articles---initially in \PS{} form only---of the +\emph{Cahiers} and \emph{Lettre GUTenberg}). It was also proposed that +all non-English publications try and provide an abstract in both the +local language and in English, so that these abstracts can be +published in \TUB\ (or elsewhere). Editors were also asked to +signal potential articles that might be interesting for translation +into English and publication into \TUB\ (of course, editors can +translate articles from \TUB\ into their national language also!). +Presently, CSTUG, GUST, GUTenberg, NTG, TUG, and \ukt\ are working on +a TEXART CD-ROM that will make all publications of those user groups +available on this electronic medium (and on the Web). It was also +agreed that each author should be asked permission to reprint her/his +article(s) in this way. During the meeting Gerard had the pleasure to +offer the third \emph{MAPS} award to Barbara Beeton, the most senior and +long-standing editor present for her 16 years of efforts to make +\TUB\ an example of the typographic quality that can be achieved +with \TeX{}. + +At the end of the conference dinner in the evening a set of books +written (and dedicated) by Donald Knuth were put up for sale to the +highest bidder. Even Lamport's \LaTeX{} book got a nice inscription by +the hand of Knuth. After I let the the volumes of the ``Art of +Computer Programming'' escape I concentrated on the ``big one'', +namely the five volumes of \emph{Computers \& Typesetting}, who became +mine for the nice little round sum of \$700. Adorned with the +dedication of Donald Knuth this will remain one of the treasures of my +personal library! The sales were an outstanding success and about +\$1800 were collected towards the funding of the Euro\TeX{} bus which +will take participants from Russia and central Europe to the +Euro\TeX{}95 Conference in Papendaal (the Netherlands). Many thanks +to Addison-Wesley, who donated the books. + +\section{Thursday July 27th} + +In his presentation T.~V.~Raman gave an overview of ASTER---an Audio +System For Technical Rea\-dings---the system he demonstrated the day +before. ASTER renders \LaTeX{} documents in an audible way, so that +visually impaired persons can ``listen'' to their contents. Raman +emphasized the importance of the use of clear generic markup for the +input source document to ease the extraction of structural logical +information that can be easily translated into an internal +representation. ASTER then renders information by applying rendering +rules written in AFL---Audio Formatting Language---to the internal +representation. In a sense AFL is to audio formatting what \PS{} is to +visual formatting (although AFL is by far not as complex). As a +conclusion he emphasized that one needs a semantic-oriented DTD to +produce a high-quality audio document. Since no such completely +general DTD can be constructed, one has to use the facilities provided +by \LaTeX{} and its hyper\TeX{}t extensions. + +Mark Doyle next reviewed the purpose and history of the Los Alamos preprint +server, which is one of the first (and more successful) document +servers on the Web. In fact it started in the area of +(theoretical) High Energy Physics and took place in close +collaboration with CERN (where WWW was ``invented''). Today several +tens of thousands of preprints are available online and over 20000 +users visit the server each day. Although at present most documents +are only available as (mainly \TeX) source and standard \PS{}, they are +now producing \PDF{} versions that include cross-references to +other documents on the Web using the \texttt{hyper\TeX} tool and \PDF\ +hypertext links. In this way cross-references to other +documents can be easily instantiated. + +During the next half-hour I gave an introduction to Nikos Drakos' tool +\texttt{latex2html} and showed how by simple customization the visual +quality of the output HTML files can be substantially improved. I went +on the show how the \texttt{latex2html} system also allows for +interconnecting separate documents. I ended with a few examples of +HTML3 output generated by an ad-hoc program developed at CERN and +viewed with the HTML3-capable \texttt{arena} browser. + +After the break Sebastian Rahtz showed how with his \texttt{hypertex} +package (sharing some code with the \texttt{Hyper\TeX} package +discussed earlier by Mark Doyle) it is easy to turn \LaTeX{} documents +into hyper-documents. Their ``hyper'' contents can be enriched by +adding supplementary information about \LaTeX's cross-references via +\Lcs{special} commands. These are picked up and translated into +\PDF{}'s \texttt{pdfmark} commands by Mark Doyle's ``hypertext'' +\texttt{dvihps} program, an extension to Tom Rokicki's \texttt{dvips} +program. Tom stated that these extensions will end up, in one form +or another, in the forthcoming upgrade of standard \texttt{dvips}. + +The afternoon started by a second presentation of the \emph{4All\TeX} +system, and, as always, there was great admiration amongst all those +present for the ease with which it is possible to ``plug and play'', +i.e., start to setup and run the system without much ado. It became +all the more evident that such a CD-ROM for Unix is a real need, and a +recurring proposal for the next great thing that TUG should come up +with (and we are surely thinking about a way get this done). + +During the next hour I gave an introduction to SGML using HTML as an +example of a DTD, and showed that it is not difficult to understand +the structure and syntax of a DTD, and from there to figure out the +various possible document elements, their attributes and the entities +that are available to the user. Work on other DTD's for mathematics +and tables were briefly mentioned, as were a few tools for authoring +and checking SGML documents. I came away with the feeling that at the +end of my talk most of the audience had a more balanced view about +what SGML is, and what it is not. I therefore hope that my presentation +will also contribute to eliminate most of the artificial animosity +between the SGML and \TeX{} worlds. As Sebastian, myself and a few of +the other speakers tried to show, SGML is about structure, and \TeX{} +about typesetting, and the two tools are therefore complementary and +both useful. + +Chris Hamlin, in the last scheduled talk of the day, described the +production work at the American Physical Society, and, as expected, it +is similar in content, form, and structure to what we had heard by +other speakers (at this conference Elsevier, or at other conferences +Springer, OUP, etc.), namely a mixture of \TeX{} and other +word-processor inputs are accepted by the production team. The +proportion of \TeX{} sources varies wildly between publications +(between almost nothing in the chemical journals to well over 50--60\% +in some of the physical journals). Various house styles are available, +and at present ways are being investigated to translate the inputs +into SGML to take full advantage of electronic publishing tools. + +The last part of the afternoon was for the TUG Business meeting. + +\section{Friday July 28th 1995} + +Already Friday. It seemed as though the Conference only just started, +but the bags at the sides of the room and the now-empty vendor's room +made us realize that we were only here for another few hours. + +The morning started with a paper submitted by Jonathan Fine, but read +by Alan Hoenig in Jonathan's absence. The title was \emph{New + perspectives in \TeX{} Macros} and dealt with a possible way of +combining the advantages of both SGML and \TeX. His \TeX{} macro +package \textsc{simsim} takes SGML and style files as input and +generates pages formatted with \TeX{} as output. \textsc{simsim} comes +with an SGML parser and the style files are used to link \TeX{} +actions to SGML events. The \textsc{simsim} system also offers a +programming environment for writing \TeX{} macros and style files. At +present issues of performance were not addressed directly but on +sample documents the speed was comparable to that of \LaTeX{}. All by +all an interesting idea, and I look forward to see Jonathan's finished +product soon. + +Sergey Lesenko then told us about his \emph{t1part} tool that +partially embeds Type1 \PS{} font files into a document. The +principle is to include the \PS{} code for only those characters that +are actually referenced. This can result in huge savings in size if +one uses only a few characters from many fonts (the procedure is based +on the same model that includes only the necessary Type3 bitmaps for +characters built with \MF). Tom Rokicki and Sergey have been working +together over the last few months and this facility will be built into +the ``next'' version of Tom's \texttt{dvips}. I mentioned that Basil +Malushev has a somewhat similar utility \texttt{fload}, that uses the +publicly available \texttt{ghostscript} program to make a map of all +referenced fonts and then includes only the characters needed. +Basil's approach can be used for any kind of \PS{} file, so that it is +complementary to Sergey's which is well integrated with \TeX{} and +needs no supplementary external program. During the discussion there +were some interesting remarks on copyright issues connected with +including Type1 fonts inside documents. It was felt that, although +partial font loading would make pirating fonts less effective, it +does not mean that all font vendors would agree to let us include +their fonts in this way in files distributed electronically (on CD-ROMs +or the Internet). To be continued\ldots + +A more technical talk, on \MF{} this time, was Jeremy Gibbons' +presentation \emph{Dotted and dashed lines in \MF}. He showed that +drawing evenly spaced dotted and dashed lines in \MF{} is a +non-trivial task, and he proposed several solutions to make it +possible. He introduced the notions \emph{evenly spaced in time} as +opposed to \emph{equally spaced in space} and went on to show that +they are far from identical, since points can move at different +``speeds'' in space as they progress along a path evenly in time. +Using recursive adaptive refinement techniques he showed how one can +solve the problem in \MF. His procedure can be extended to allow for +dashed, or alternating dashes and dots. As recursive techniques have +the unwanted feature that they can overflow the stack, Jeremy also +proposed a solution based on an iterative non-adaptive technique that, +although perhaps less elegant and automatic, does the job almost +equally well. At the end of his talk he showed several attempts at +drawing an attractive muskrat, the logo of the \emph{Mississippi + Muskrats} jazz band he used to play in. + +The last scheduled talk was by Robin Fairbairns. After explaining the +principles of the \PS{} multiple master Type1 font format, Robin +showed how a crude first system of using these fonts with \TeX{} was +set up. All font instances are expressed in function of weights with +respect to the master designs. These weights are calculated by the +\PS{} interpreter from the design parameters via the \PS{} operator +\texttt{ConvertDesignVector}. One has to use version 3.x of the +\texttt{ghostscript} program to extract the weights, which were then +used to generate the Adobe Font Metrics (AFM) instances from the AFM +files for the master designs. Then Rokicki's \texttt{afm2tfm} program +was run to generate corresponding tfm files needed by \TeX{}, while a +header file was also defined to allow \texttt{dvips} to actually +specify the font instances from the weightvector. This set up was used +to typeset the last issue of \ukt's magazine \BV\ in +Minion, one of Adobe's Multiple Master fonts. + +The morning ended with the ``Closing Ceremony'' and the announcements +of the TUG95 prize winners. + +Christina Thiele, as vendor and public-relations liaison thanked the +various companies who had vendor booths or otherwise contributed to +the TUG95 conference, in particular Addison-Wesley for the books they +donated (and that were put on for sale on the Wednesday evening for +the Euro\TeX95 bus, and still a few left for another sales idea we are +playing with for spicing the TUG96 bursary. Stay tuned to \TUB\ or +\emph{TTN}!). + +Mimi Burbank, as Chair of the Organizing Committee, thanked all the +people at SCRI who helped her financially, organizationally, by +providing PC's or a printer. She also thanked the extremely efficient +hotel staff for their never-ending devotion to a job well-done. + +Sebastian Rahtz, the chair of the Programming Committee, then +announced the prize winners for TUG95. Just before coffee that +morning all participants were asked to write down an ordered list of +the four papers they liked most, and on the basis of that list it was +Raman who was selected as best presentation, best paper, and most +important contribution to the \TeX{} world (and humanity, one person +wrote). The Knuth prize, for the paper discussing something that he +``forgot'' in his \TeX{} program, went to Petr Sojka for his work on +hyphenation. Other prizes went to Richard Kinch for \texttt{MetaFog} +(who put his prize copy of Textures up for sale, so that the +Euro\TeX{} bus got again somewhat more money to take home), Alan +Hoenig for his marvellous Poetica work, Jeremy Gibbons for his +entertaining and erudite explanation of \MF, and Sergey Lesenko and +Tom Rokicki for partial font downloading, and work on dvi standards. +Many thanks are due to the fine \TeX\ vendors Blue Sky Research, Y\&Y, +PC\TeX, and Richard Kinch, who generously donated copies of their +products for the prizes. + +Of course we did not forget +our friends from NTG, without which this conference would not have +been the same. Their \emph{4All\TeX} CD-ROM was one of the highlights +at this conference (they sold about 40 copies, and the remaining 60 +were taken to the TUG office for selling them to the North American +TUG community). Their ``presence'', good humour, the organization of +the book auction, the coordination of the TEX-ED initiative and the +hundred or so photos they took made them a memorable and unforgettable +part of this meeting. Therefore a signed copy of the \MF{} book was +given to Wietse Dol. In a gesture underlining their dedication to +\TeX{} and TUG Wietse then offered TUG the two golden (original) +CD-masters of the third edition of \emph{4All\TeX} that just appeared. +I had the pleasure to receive them in name of TUG and I promised that +they would be framed and displayed in a prominent place in the TUG +office in San Francisco. The gifts were concluded with the UK \TeX\ +Users Group and TUG presented 2 bottles of wine, and 2 boxes of +chocolates, to Don Knuth, maintaining the `2' theme begun by NTG's 2 +CDs at the start of the conference. + +Finally it was my duty to formally end the TUG95 meeting, and after +thanking Knuth for his presence, which made this $2^{2^{2}}$th meeting +even more special, I re-iterated the thanks to all vendors, SCRI and +the hotel staff, for their display of (southern) American hospitality. +Then I invited all participants to the next (17th) TUG annual meeting +in 1996 in Dubna (Russia, 150 kms north of Moscow, on the Volga +River), where from July 28th to August 1st TUG96 will be hosted by the +Joint Institute of Nuclear Research. + +During the afternoon Alan Hoenig gave a partical introduction to the +use of virtual fonts. He showed how they can be used to create new +characters as various combinations of glyphs and rules. He described +how Alan Jeffrey's \texttt{fontinst} package allows one to easily +install \PS{} font families. In his usual pedagogical approach Alan +made it all sound as though it is extremely simple and +straightforward, and all fifty participants to this last ``event'' of +the conference came away with the feeling there were ready to generate +some virtual fonts themselves. + +\end{Article} + + + + + + + |