From e0c6872cf40896c7be36b11dcc744620f10adf1d Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Norbert Preining Date: Mon, 2 Sep 2019 13:46:59 +0900 Subject: Initial commit --- macros/latex-dev/doc/ltnews21.tex | 255 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 255 insertions(+) create mode 100644 macros/latex-dev/doc/ltnews21.tex (limited to 'macros/latex-dev/doc/ltnews21.tex') diff --git a/macros/latex-dev/doc/ltnews21.tex b/macros/latex-dev/doc/ltnews21.tex new file mode 100644 index 0000000000..b7c87d6f32 --- /dev/null +++ b/macros/latex-dev/doc/ltnews21.tex @@ -0,0 +1,255 @@ +% \iffalse meta-comment +% +% Copyright 2014 +% The LaTeX3 Project and any individual authors listed elsewhere +% in this file. +% +% This file is part of the LaTeX base system. +% ------------------------------------------- +% +% It may be distributed and/or modified under the +% conditions of the LaTeX Project Public License, either version 1.3c +% of this license or (at your option) any later version. +% The latest version of this license is in +% http://www.latex-project.org/lppl.txt +% and version 1.3c or later is part of all distributions of LaTeX +% version 2005/12/01 or later. +% +% This file has the LPPL maintenance status "maintained". +% +% The list of all files belonging to the LaTeX base distribution is +% given in the file `manifest.txt'. See also `legal.txt' for additional +% information. +% +% The list of derived (unpacked) files belonging to the distribution +% and covered by LPPL is defined by the unpacking scripts (with +% extension .ins) which are part of the distribution. +% +% \fi +% Filename: ltnews21.tex +% +% This is issue 21 of LaTeX News. + +\documentclass{ltnews} +\def\ConTeXt{C\kern-.0333emon\-\kern-.0667em\TeX\kern-.0333emt} +\usepackage[T1]{fontenc} + +\usepackage{lmodern,url,hologo} + +\publicationmonth{May} +\publicationyear{2014} + +\publicationissue{21} + +\begin{document} + +\maketitle + +\section{Scheduled \LaTeX\ bug-fix release} + +This issue of \LaTeX~News marks the second bug-fix release of +\LaTeXe\ (standard \LaTeX) since shifting to a new build system in 2009. +Provided sufficient changes are made, we expect to +make such releases yearly or every two years, in sync with \TeX\ Live. + + + +\subsection{Release notes} + +This release makes no changes to the core code in the \LaTeXe\ format +but there are a small number of documentation fixes (not listed +here). In addition several packages in the \textsf{base} and +\textsf{required} areas have been updated as detailed below. + + +This has been done in accordance with the philosophy of minimising +problems in both forwards and backwards compatibility, so most of +these changes should not be noticed by the regular \LaTeX\ user. + +References in the text below of the form ``graphics/3873'' are to +bug reports listed +at:\\ \url{http://latex-project.org/cgi-bin/ltxbugs2html} + + +\let\paragraph\subsubsection + +\paragraph{\textsf{fixltx2e} updates} + + + +There are a number of bugs and faulty design decisions in \LaTeXe{} +that should have been corrected long ago in the kernel code. However, +such corrections cannot be done as this would break backwards +compatibility in the following sense. A large number of documents +exist by now that have worked around the bug or have even made use of +a particular misfeature. Thus changing the kernel code would break +too many existing documents. + +The corrections for these types of bug have therefore been collected together +in a package that can be loaded only when needed; its name is \textsf{fixltx2e}. +For this release we made the following changes to this package: +\begin{itemize} +\item + Misspelled float placement specifiers such as + \verb=\begin{figure}[tv]= instead of \texttt{tb} are silently + ignored by the kernel code. Now we test for such letters and issue + an error message. +\item + \LaTeX's float handling algorithm can get out of sync if you mix + single and double-column floats (as they are placed independently + of each other). This was corrected in \textsf{fixltx2e} a few years ago + but the fix was not perfect as one situation using + \verb=\enlargethispage= generated a low-level \TeX{} error. + This behaviour of the package is now improved. +\end{itemize} + + + + +\paragraph{New \textsf{fltrace} package} + +For years the file \texttt{ltoutput.dtx} contained some hidden code to +trace the detailed behaviour of the float placement algorithm of +\LaTeX. Prompted by questions on StackExchange we now extract this +code into a new \textsf{fltrace} package. To see the float algorithm +in action (or to understand why it decides to place all your floats at +the very end of the document) use +\begin{verbatim} + \usepackage{fltrace} \tracefloats +\end{verbatim} +To stop tracing somewhere in the document use +\verb=\tracefloatsoff= and to see the current value of various float +parameters use \verb=\tracefloatvals=. As the package is identical to +the kernel code with tracing added, it may or may not work if you load any +other package that manipulates that part of the kernel code. In such a +case your best bet is to load \textsf{fltrace} first. + +\paragraph{\textsf{inputenc} package updates} + +The \textsf{inputenc} package allows different input encodings for +\LaTeX\ documents to be specified including the important +\texttt{utf8} option used to specify the Unicode UTF-8 encoding. A +common mistake in documents has been to also include this option when +using the Unicode-based \TeX\ engines \hologo{LuaTeX} and \hologo{XeTeX} +producing strange errors as these engines natively deal with UTF-8 +characters. + +If a document stored in an 8bit encoding is processed by +\hologo{pdfTeX}, it needs the \textsf{inputenc} package to work +correctly. However, if such a document is processed unchanged by +\hologo{LuaTeX} or \hologo{XeTeX}, then accented characters may +silently get dropped from the output. + +The package has been modified so that if used with \hologo{LuaTeX} or +\hologo{XeTeX}, then it just issues a warning if \texttt{utf8} or +\texttt{ascii} is specified, and stops with an error for any other +encoding requested. + + + +One further improvement has been made to the encoding definition files +(\texttt{.def}) used by \textsf{inputenc}: the catcode of \texttt{@} +is now saved and restored when reading them instead of always using +\verb=\makeatother= inside the files (latex/4192). + + + +\paragraph{The tools directory} + +In the past each of the sub-directories in the ``required'' section of +the \LaTeX{} distribution contained a single \texttt{.ins} file to +generate the code files from the source files. We have now +started to provide individual \texttt{.ins} files for each of those +packages that are likely to require updates outside a major +\LaTeX{} release. + +\paragraph{\textsf{multicol} updates} + +Version 1.8 of \textsf{multicol} implements some improvements/fixes +and one extension. In the past the balancing algorithm enlarged the +column height until it found a solution that satisfied all +constraints. If there were insufficient break points then the final +column height could have been much larger than expected and if that +happened near the end of the page it resulted in the text overflowing +into the bottom margin. This situation is now detected and in that +case a normal page is cut and balancing is resumed on the next +page. Some overflow is still allowed and controlled via the parameter +\verb=\maxbalancingoverflow=. + +The use of \verb=\enlargethispage= is now properly supported within +the environment. Finally a new command \verb=\docolaction= was added +to allow the execution of code depending on the column in which the +command is executed. See the documentation for details. + +Bug fixes: the new version fixes both a color leak that could happen +in certain situations and the problem that \texttt{multicols} could +mess up the positioning of \verb=\marginpar=s that followed the +environment. + + +\paragraph{\textsf{tabularx} updates} + +The restrictions on embedding \verb|\tabularx| \verb|\endtabularx| +into the definition of a new environment have been relaxed +slightly. See the package documentation for details. + +\paragraph{\textsf{showkeys} updates} + +The \textsf{showkeys} package has been updated to fix problems if used +at the start of list items, and to work if brace groups (\verb|{| and +\verb|}|) are used in the optional argument of +\verb|\cite|. (tools/4162, tools/4173) + + +\paragraph{\textsf{color} updates} + +The \verb|\nopagecolor| command suggested by Heiko Oberdiek, +available for some years in the \textsf{pdftex} option, has been +added to the core package as suggested in graphics/3873. Currently +this is supported in the driver files for \textsf{dvips} and +\textsf{pdftex}. Patches to support other drivers are welcome. + + \paragraph{\textsf{graphicx} updates} + +The \textsf{graphicx} version of \verb|\rotatebox| now allows +\verb|\par| (and blank lines) in values, to match the change made +to the \textsf{graphics} version some years ago. See graphics/4296. + + +\paragraph{\textsf{keyval} updates} + +All parsing used in the \textsf{keyval} package has been changed +to allow \verb|\par| (and blank lines) in values. +(A second change, to parsing of brace groups +in a construct such as \texttt{key=\{\{\{value\}\}\}}, was reverted in v1.15.) +See graphics/3446. + + + + +\vfill + +\section{Standard \LaTeX\ (\LaTeXe) and \textsf{expl3}} + +The substantial collection of innovative code in \textsf{expl3} +implements a new programming language that has for a while now been +used by some writers of \LaTeXe\ packages. This code has recently +also been made available for use on top of plain \TeX\ or {\ConTeXt}, +largely to support generic packages that are supposed to work with +different flavours of \TeX. These uses in no way affect authors of +\LaTeX\ documents and such \LaTeXe\ packages will continue to work as +advertised by their authors with standard \LaTeX. + +This code base will also become an important foundation for the kernel +of \LaTeX3 and so the new programming language can be described as +`The \LaTeX3 Programming Language'. However, if you see or hear that a +package `uses \LaTeX3' then it remains very unlikely (as yet) to mean +that the package is part of some `new version of \LaTeX'. + +News about the development and use of \textsf{expl3} and about other +developments in the \LaTeX3 code base is reported regularly in the +\LaTeX3~News series (\url{http://latex-project.org/l3news/}), the most +recent issue of which was published in March 2014. + + +\end{document} -- cgit v1.2.3