Subject: RE: [xsl] XSL-FO versus PostScript From: "Roger Glover" <glover_roger@xxxxxxxxx> Date: Wed, 26 Feb 2003 17:36:31 -0600 |
J.Pietschmann wrote: > Zack Brown wrote: > > So, to sum up your argument, PostScript does give more power, > > but XSL-FO makes some things (footnotes, page number alignment, > > etc) easy, that PostScript has no basic provisions for? > Yes. PS is, in general lower level than XSLFO, you can position > individual strings and graphic elements (=more power), but it lacks > higher abstractions (margins, indentations, borders, justification, > alignment, floats, page numbering, hyphenation and some more) Right. Most PostScript documents include a large preamble called a dictionary (think "library"). The dictionary typically defines much of that higher level of abstraction, depending on the generator. > > ...but I wonder if there are any PostScript subroutine libraries out > > there that try to bridge that gap. A quick google search didn't find > > any. > No surprise. Just try a "Hello world" yourself... Actually, you might try looking for "dictionaries" instead of "libraries". > >>inherited from CSS (the most notable immediate predecessor). > > > > I think TeX came before CSS. That's what I used in the > early/mid 90's. It > > was really great, but very rigid in ways that seemed arbitrary (like not > > using memory that was available on the system, even when the alternative > > was to terminate without completing its task). In spite of its flaws it > > was very powerful and even beautiful in its way. > > I wrote *immediate* predecessor for a reason, CSS was taken as starting > point for XSLFO and is still quite explicitely referred. I seem to recall the lineage being more from DSSSL than from CSS, but I suppose I could be wrong. > TeX was certainly one of the poineering applications in computerized > typesetting, and in fact virtually every modern typesetting system > still draws on the line breaking, filling, hyphenation and math expression > typesetting algorithms first hammered out for TeX. Which, of course, borrowed same from *it's* predecessors, including Runoff on DEC systems, GML on IBM mainframes, and [nt]roff on UNIX systems. These in turn borrowed greatly from electronic typesetting machines > However, TeX did not > provide many good abstractions above paragraphs and formulas. It's > strength was (and still is) that it's basically a programming language > with a good run time library for typesetting. This allowed building many > interesting abstractions on top of it. In fact, I think packages like > LaTeX were a major milestone in the development of semantic markup and > therefore in the lineage of XML. While LaTex was certainly much easier to learn and use than the aforementioned tools, I don't think it broke ground in any major new functional areas. -- Roger Glover glover_roger@xxxxxxxxx XSL-List info and archive: http://www.mulberrytech.com/xsl/xsl-list
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