RE: SGML->Latex with Dsssl [Was Re: Formatting mathematics]

["Reynolds, Gregg" <greynolds@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

But DSSSL is far more than a style language; "the point of DSSSL" for
me, at least at this point, is not so much the style language as the
groves abstraction and SDQL.  Which is another way of saying that SGML
markup is the "real" point.  We get not only reusable SDQL, but reusable
structured text.

For others, the style language is what counts.  To each his/her own.
Someday, maybe, the full DSSSL style language will be implemented and
the need for workarounds will go away.  In the meantime, Jade's SDQL
lets us hack.  Look at what twisted and perverse things people have done
in order to get around the limitations of html and produce wonderful
results; why not be just as deviant with DSSSL?  Who says we should only
use it to make flow objects?  I've done some very useful (to me) things
constructing a single flow object and dumping text into it using the
SGML backend as a text backend (just do "make element" and leave out the
gi: ).

Getting back to the original issue of formatting math: I agree with your
earlier point that Jade/DSSSL is not up to doing a large technical
publication, but only as regards the style language.  But using Jade as
a "converter" to get from SGML source to LaTeX is more than adequate to
meet the goal of maintaining source in SGML and getting LaTeX quality
output.  It may indeed be true that other tools are adequate to do this
"conversion" (I prefer to think of it as a "rendition"); I haven't
looked at the one you mentioned.  But can they really match the power of
a scheme-like SDQL?

(I didn't get time to hack out some mathml stuff this weekend; maybe in
a few weeks...)


> -----Original Message-----
> From:	s.rahtz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx [SMTP:s.rahtz@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
> well, thats the problem, isnt it, the level at which to work. do you
> do the styling of a section head in terms of DSSSL, in raw TeX
> emitted, or in a LaTeX style file? Once you start having LaTeX style
> files coming into the equation, most of the point of DSSSL has
> gone. 
> 
> people have argued that what is needed is a translator from DSSSL to
> LaTeX *stylesheet*, rather than LaTeX markup. Use all the elegance of
> DSSSL as a front end to composing LaTeX styles. I cant get my head
> round it, personally, its just seems perverse.
> 
> sebastian
> 
> 
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