On Thursday 23 January 2003 20:00, David Kastrup wrote:

> > (1) eTeX is better than LaTeX
>
> You are confused.  LaTeX is a macro package which can be used under
> both TeX and eTeX.

I guess I should say "for LaTeX read latex throughout".
I was of course referring to the program that runs when one types l-a-t-e-x.
(Reminds me of the footnote in "1066 and All That" --
for "pheasant" read "peasant" throughout.)

> > (3) Therefore eTeX should be renamed LaTeX,
> > and LaTeX renamed dinoTeX.
>
> No.  eTeX would keep its name, and LaTeX would keep its name.  The
> executable called `latex' would refer to a LaTeX format running on
> the evirtex executable.

Let me reword it:
elatex will be renamed latex, and latex will be renamed urlatex.

> > But I do not at the moment feel any urge to use \splitdiscards or
> > any of the other macros you suggest, and in fact wouldn't have the
> > slightest idea how to use them anyway.
>
> And for that reason nobody else must ever be allowed to use them?
> And LaTeX must never be improved to provide facilities that are
> pretty much impossible to implement without them?

If as you say LaTeX runs -- and will run? -- equally on virTeX and eTeX
then surely your only problem in running eTeX
is typing the extra "e" in "elatex".

> Again, if you demand that you may never be able to do anything with
> LaTeX beyond what you can do now, the solution is simple: don't
> upgrade, ever.

I don't mind upgrading every 6 TeX-months
(like the speed of light, TeX-time seems to be slowing down)
and am very grateful for the extra facilities
that have been provided over the years.

> There is no reason to switch to eTeX if eTeX features are not used,
> and nobody dares use eTeX features if they must assume that they are
> not available.

Why on earth not "dare"?
Are you saying that eTeX is on the point of expiring?

> Better memory utilization, more functionality from some package (like
> the trace package), more working styles, more working documents (no
> room for a further dimen will get much rarer...), bidirectional
> typesetting might work inadvertantly and so on.  How horrible.  How
> devastating.

The only concrete advantage you've mentioned as far as I am concerned
is "bidirectional typesetting".

> Please come up with a single good reason why you would consider it a
> disadvantage if your favorite TeX distribution were to get an
> eTeX-based latex executable and format.

I would prefer to use Knuth's program
unless very strong reasons were put forward to abandon it.

I still think that if you want to persuade people  like me
of the virtues of eTeX you need to descend to our level,
and show actual advantages in real LaTeX programs (including packages)
which we can appreciate.

It's not enough to say that there are a few people
living on top of Mount Everest
whose lives would be greatly simplified.



--
Timothy Murphy
e-mail: [log in to unmask]
tel: +353-86-233 6090
s-mail: School of Mathematics, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland