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-% language=uk
-
-\startcomponent musings-whytex
-
-\environment musings-style
-
-\startchapter[title={Why use \TEX ?}]
-
-\startsection[title={Introduction}]
-
-Let's assume that you know what \TEX\ is: a program that interprets a language
-with the same name that makes it possible to convert (tagged) input into for
-instance \PDF. For many of its users it is a black box: you key in some text, hit
-a button and get some typeset result in return. After a while you start tweaking
-this black box, meet other users (on the web), become more fluent and stick to it
-forever.
-
-But now let's assume that you don't know \TEX\ and are in search of a system
-that helps you create beautiful documents in an efficient way. When your
-documents have a complex structure you are probably willing to spend some time on
-figuring out what the best tool is. Even if a search lets you end up with
-something called \TEX, a three letter word with a dropped E, you still don't
-know what it is. Advertisement for \TEX\ is often pretty weak. It's rather easy
-to point to the numerous documents that can be found on the web. But what exactly
-does \TEX\ do and what are its benefits? In order to answer this we need to know
-who you are: an author, editor, an organization that deals with documents or needs
-to generate readable output, like publishers do.
-
-\stopsection
-
-\startsection[title={Authors}]
-
-We start with authors. Students of sciences that use mathematics don't have much
-of a choice. But most of these documents hardly communicate the message that
-\quotation {Everyone should use \TEX.} or that \quotation {All documents produced
-by \TEX\ look great.} but they do advocate that for rendering math it is a pretty
-good system. The source code of these documents often look rather messy and
-unattractive and for a non|-|math user it can be intimidating. Choosing some
-lightweight click|-|and|-|ping alternative looks attractive.
-lightweight click|-|and|-|ping alternative looks attractive.
-
-Making \TEX\ popular is not going to happen by convincing those who have to write
-an occasional letter or report. They should just use whatever suits them. On the
-other hand if you love consistency, long term support, need math, are dealing
-with a rare language or script, like to reuse content, prefer different styling
-from one source, use one source for multiple documents, or maybe love open source
-tools, then you are a candidate. Of course there is a learning curve but normally
-you can master \TEX\ rather fast and once you get the hang of it there's often no
-way back. But you always need to invest a bit beforehand.
-
-So what authors are candidates for \TEX ? It could be that \TEX\ is the only tool
-that does the job. If so, you probably learned that from someone who saw you
-struggle or had the same experience and wrote or talked about it somewhere. In
-that case using \TEX\ for creating just one document (like a thesis) makes sense.
-Otherwise, you should really wonder if you want to invest time in a tool that you
-probably have to ditch later on as most organizations stick to standard
-(commercial) word processing tools.
-
-Talking to customers we are often surprised that people have heard about \TEX, or
-even used it for a few documents in college. Some universities just prescribe the
-use of \TEX\ for reporting, so not much of a choice there. Memories are normally
-rather positive in the sense that they know that it can do the job and that it's
-flexible.
-
-User group journals, presentations at \TEX\ meetings, journals, books and manuals
-that come with \TEX\ macro packages can all be used to determine if this tool
-suits an author. Actually, I started using \TEX\ because the original \TEX book
-had some magic, and reading it was just that: reading it, as I had no running
-implementation. A few years later, when I had to write (evolving) reports, I
-picked up again. But I'm not a typical user.
-
-\stopsection
-
-\startsection[title={Programmers}]
-
-When you are a programmer who has to generate reports, for instance in \PDF, or
-write manuals, then \TEX\ can really be beneficial. Of course \TEX\ is not always
-an obvious choice, but if you're a bit able to use it it's hard to beat in
-quality, flexibility and efficiency. I'm often surprised that companies are
-willing to pay a fortune for functionality that basically comes for free.
-Programmers are accustomed to running commands and working in a code editor with
-syntax highlighting so that helps too. They too recognize when something can be
-done more efficiently.
-
-When you need to go from some kind of input (document source, database,
-generated) to some rendered output there currently are a few endpoints: a
-(dynamic) \HTML\ page, a \PDF\ document, something useable in a word processor,
-or a representation using the desktop user interface. It's the second category
-where \TEX\ is hard to beat but even using \TEX\ and \METAPOST\ for creating a
-chart can make sense.
-
-There are of course special cases where \TEX\ fits in nicely. Say that you have
-to combine \PDF\ documents. There are numerous tools to do that and \TEX\ is one.
-The advantage of \TEX\ over other tools is that it's trivial to add additional
-text, number pages, provide headers and footers. And it will work forever. Why?
-Because \TEX\ has been around for decades and will be around for decades to come.
-It's an independent component. The problem with choosing for \TEX\ is that the
-starting point is important. The question is not \quotation {What tool should I
-use?} but \quotation {What problem do I need to solve?}. An open discussion about
-the objectives and possibilities is needed, not some checklist based on
-assumptions. If you don't know \TEX\ and have never worked with a programmable
-typesetting environment, you probably don't see the possibilities. In fact, you
-might even choose for \TEX\ for the wrong reasons.
-
-The problem with this category of users is that they seldom have the freedom to
-choose their tools. There are not that many jobs where the management is able to
-recognize the clever programmer who can determine that \TEX\ is suitable for a
-lot of jobs and can save money and time. Even the long term availability and
-support is not an argument since not only most tools (or even apis) changes every
-few years but also organizations themselves change ownership, objectives, and
-personnel on a whim. The concept of \quote {long term} is hard to grasp for most
-people (just look at politics) and it's only in retrospect that one can say
-\quote {We used that toolkit for over a decade.}
-
-\stopsection
-
-\startsection[title={Organizations}]
-
-Authors (often) have the advantage that they can choose themselves: they can use
-what they like. In practice any decent programmer is able to find the suitable
-tools but convincing the management to use one of them can be a challenge. Here
-we're also talking of \quote {comfort zones}: you have to like a tool(chain).
-Organizations normally don't look for \TEX. Special departments are responsible
-for choosing and negotiating whatever is used in a company. Unfortunately
-companies don't always start from the open question \quotation {We have this
-problem, we want to go there, what should we do?} and then discuss options with
-for instance those who know \TEX. Instead requirements are formulated and matches
-are found. The question then is \quotation {Are these requirements cut in stone?}
-and if not (read: we just omit some requirements when most alternatives don't
-meet them), were other requirements forgotten? Therefore organizations can end up
-with the wrong choice (using \TEX\ in a situation where it makes no sense) or
-don't see opportunities (not using \TEX\ while it makes most sense). It doesn't
-help that a hybrid solution (use a mix of \TEX\ and other tools) is often not an
-option. Where an author can just stop using a tool after a few days of
-disappointment, and where a programmer can play around a bit before making a
-choice, an organization probably best can start small with a proof of concept.
-
-Let's take a use case. A publisher wants to automatically convert \XML\ files
-into \PDF. One product can come from multiple sources (we have cases where
-thousands of small \XML\ files combine into one final product). Say that we have
-three different layouts: a theory book, a teachers manual and an answer book. In
-addition special proofing documents have to be rendered. The products might be
-produced on demand with different topics in any combination. There is at least
-one image and table per page, but there can be more. There are color and
-backgrounds used, tables of contents generated, there is extensive cross
-referencing and an index. Of course there is math.
-
-Now let's assume an initial setup costs 20K Euro and, what happens often when the
-real products show up, a revision after one year takes the same amount. We also
-assume 10K for the following eight years for support. So, we end up with 120K
-over 10 years. If one goes cheap we can consider half of that, or we can be
-pessimistic and double the amount.
-
-The first year 10K pages are produced, the second year 20K and after that 30K per
-year. So, we're talking of 270K pages. If we include customer specific documents
-and proofing we might as well end up with a multiple of that.
-
-So, we have 120K Euro divided by 270K pages or about half an Euro per page. But
-likely we have more pages so it costs less. If we double the costs then we can
-assume that some major changes took place which means more pages. In fact we had
-projects where the layout changed, all documents were regenerated and the costs
-were included in the revision, so far from double. We also see many more pages
-being generated so in practice the price per page drops below half an Euro. The
-more we process the cheaper it gets and one server can produce a lot of pages!
-
-Now, the interesting bit of such a calculation is that the costs only concern the
-hours spent on a solution. A \TEX\ based system comes for free and there are no
-license costs. Whatever alternative is taken, even if it is as flexible, it will
-involve additional costs. From the perspective of costs it's very hard to beat
-\TEX. Add to that the possibility for custom extensions, long term usage and the
-fact that one can adapt the system. The main question of course is: does it do
-the job. The only way to find out is to either experiment (which is free),
-consult an expert (not free, but then needed anyway for any solution) or ask an
-expert to make a proof of concept (also not free but relatively cheap and
-definitely cheaper than a failure). In fact, before making decisions about what
-solution is best it might be a good idea to check with an expert anyway, because
-more or less than one thinks might be possible. Also, take into account that the
-\TEX\ ecosystem is often one of the first to support new technologies, and
-normally does that within its existing interface. And there is plenty of free
-support and knowledge available once you know how to find it. Instead of wasting
-time and money on advertisement and fancy websites, effort goes into support and
-development. Even if you doubt that the current provider is around in the decade
-to come, you can be sure that there will be others, simply because \TEX\ attracts
-people. Okay, it doesn't help that large companies like to out source to
-far||far||away and expect support around the corner, so in the end they might
-kill their support chain.
-
-When talking of \TEX\ used in organizations we tend to think of publishers. But
-this is only a small subset of organizations where information gets transformed
-into something presentable. For small organizations the choice for \TEX\ can be
-easy: costs, long term stability, knowing some experts are driving forces. For
-large organizations these factors seem (at least to us) hardly relevant. We've
-(had) projects where actually the choice for using a \TEX\ based solution was (in
-retrospect) a negative one: there was no other tool than this relatively unknown
-thing called \TEX. Or, because the normal tools could not be used, one ended up
-with a solution where (behind the scenes) \TEX\ is used, without the organization
-knowing it. Or, it happened that the problem at hand was mostly one that demands
-in|-|depth knowledge of manipulating content, cleaning up messy data, combining
-resources (images or \PDF\ documents), all things that happen to be available in
-the perspective of \TEX. If you can solve a hard to solve problem for them then
-an organization doesn't care what tool you use. What does matter is that the
-solution runs forever, that costs are controllable and above all, that it
-\quotation {Just works.} And if you can make it work fast, that helps too. We
-can safely claim that when \TEX\ is evaluated as being a good option, that in the
-end it always works out quite well.
-
-Among arguments that (large) organizations like to use against a choice for \TEX\
-(or something comparable) are the size of the company that they buy their
-solution from, the expected availability for support, and the wide|-|spread usage
-of the tool at hand. One can wonder if it also matters that many vendors change
-ownership, change products every few years, change license conditions when they
-like, charge a lot for support or just abort a tool chain. Unfortunately when that
-happens those responsible for choosing such a system can have moved on to another
-job, so this is seldom part of an evaluation. For the supplier the other side of
-the table is just as much of a gamble. In that respect, an organization that
-wants to use an open source (and|/|or free) solution should realize that getting
-a return on investment on such a development is pretty hard to achieve. So, who
-really takes the risk for writing open source?
-
-For us, the reason to develop \CONTEXT\ and make it open is that it fits in our
-philosophy and we like the community. It is actually not really giving us an
-advantage commercially: it costs way more to develop, support and keep
-up|-|to|-|date than it will ever return. We can come up with better, faster and
-easier solutions and in the end we pay the price because it takes less time to
-cook up styles. So there is some backslash involved because commercially a
-difficult solution leads to more billable hours. Luckily we tend to avoid wasting
-time so we improve when possible and then it ends up in the distributed code.
-And, once the solution is there, anyone can use it. Basically also for us it's
-just a tool, like the operating system, editor and viewer are. So, what keep
-development going is mostly the interaction with the community. This also means
-that a customer can't really demand functionality for free: either wait for it to
-show up or pay for it (which seldom happens). Open source is not equivalent with
-\quotation {You get immediately what you want because someone out there writes
-the code.}. There has to be a valid reason and often it's just users and meetings
-or just some challenge that drives it.
-
-This being said, it is hard to convince a company to use \TEX. It has to come
-from users in the organization. Or, what we sometimes see with publishers, it
-comes with an author team or acquired product line where it's the only option.
-Even then we seldom see transfer to other branches in the organizations. No one
-seems to wonder \quotation {How on earth can that \XML\ to \PDF\ project produce
-whatever output in large quantities in a short period of time} while other (past)
-projects failed. It probably relates to the abstraction of the process. Even
-among \TEX\ users it can be that you demonstrate something with a click on a
-button and that many years afterwards someone present at that moment tells you
-that they just discovered that this or that can be done by hitting a button. I'm
-not claiming that \TEX\ is the magic wand for everything but in some areas it's
-pretty much ahead of the pack. Go to a \TEX\ user meeting and you will be surprised
-about the accumulated diverse knowledge present in the room. It's user demand that
-drives \CONTEXT\ development, not commerce.
-
-\stopsection
-
-\startsection[title={Choosing}]
-
-So, where can one find information about \TEX\ and friends? On the web
-one has to use the right search keys, so adding \type {tex} helps: \typ {context
-tex} or \typ {xml tex pdf} and so on. Can one make a fancy hip website, sure, but
-it being a life|-|long, already old and mature environment, and given that it
-comes for free, or is used low|-|budget, not much effort and money can be spent
-on advertising it. A benefit is that no false promises and hypes are made either.
-If you want to know more, just ask the right folks.
-
-For all kind of topics one can find interesting videos and blogs. One can
-subscribe to channels on YouTube or join forums. Unfortunately not that many
-bloggers or vloggers or podcasters come up with original material every time, and
-often one starts to recognize patterns and will get boring by repetition of wisdom
-and arguments. The same is true for manuals. Is a ten year old manual really
-obsolete? Should we just recompile it to fake an update while in fact there has
-been no need for it? Should we post twenty similar presentations while one can
-do? (If one already wants to present the same topic twenty times in the first
-place?) Maybe one should compare \TEX\ with cars: they became better over time
-and can last for decades. And no new user manual is needed.
-
-As with blogs and vlogs advertising \TEX\ carries the danger for triggering
-political discussions and drawing people into discussions that are not pleasant:
-\TEX\ versus some word processor, open versus closed source, free versus paid
-software, this versus that operating system, editor such or editor so.
-
-To summarize, it's not that trivial to come up with interesting information about
-\TEX, unless one goes into details that are beyond the average user. And those
-who are involved are often involved for a long time so it gets more complex over
-time. User group journals that started with tutorials later on became expert
-platforms. This is a side effect of being an old and long|-|term toolkit. If
-you run into it, and wonder if it can serve your purpose, just ask an expert.
-
-Most \TEX\ solutions are open source and come for free as well. Of course if you
-want a specific solution or want support beyond what is offered on mailing lists
-and forums you should be willing to pay for the hours spent. For a professional
-publisher (of whatever kind) this is not a problem, if only because any other
-solution also will cost something. It is hard to come up with a general estimate.
-A popular measure of typesetting costs is the price per page, which can range
-from a couple of euro's per page to two digit numbers. We've heard of cases where
-initial setup costs were charged. If not much manual intervention is needed a
-\TEX\ solution mostly concerns initial costs.
-
-Let's return to the main question \quotation {Why use \TEX ?} in which you can
-replace \TEX\ by one of the macro packages build on top of it, for instance
-\CONTEXT. If an (somewhat older) organization considers using \TEX\ it should
-also ask itself, why it wasn't considered long ago already? For sure there have
-been developments in \TEX\ engines (in \CONTEXT\ we use \LUATEX) as well as
-possibilities of macro packages but if you look at the documents produced with
-them, there is not that much difference with decades ago. Processing has become
-faster, some things have become easier, but new technologies have always been
-supported as soon at they showed up. Advertising is often just repeating an old
-message.
-
-The \TEX\ ecosystem was among the first in supporting for instance \OPENTYPE, and
-the community even made sure that there were free fonts available. A format like
-\PDF\ was supported as soon as it shows up and \TEX\ was the first to demonstrate
-what advanced features were there and how way it was to adapt to changes.
-Processing \XML\ using \TEX\ has never been a big deal and if that is a reason to
-look at this already old and mature technology, then an organization can wonder
-if years and opportunities (for instance for publishing on demand or easy
-updating of manuals) have been lost. Of course there are (and have been)
-alternative tools but the arguments for using \TEX\ or not are not much different
-now. It can be bad marketing of open and free software. It can be that \TEX\ has
-been around too long. It can also be that its message was not understood yet. On
-the other hand, in software development it's quite common to reinvent wheels and
-present old as new. It's never to late to catch on.
-
-\stopsection
-
-\stopchapter
-
-\stopcomponent