Thread: 7.1 printed manuals
Thomas, I looked over the 7.0 docs page layout, and it looks very good. The only unusual thing I noticed is that the first line of paragraphs are slightly indented. Not sure if this is intended. Also, shouldn't we be distributing PDF files rather than PS files. I always considered PS files to be unportable because they assume you have the same fonts with identical font spacing installed on your machine. PDF embeds the fonts inside the file. The other nifty feature of PDF files is bookmarks. They are pdfmarks placed in the PS file which generates a bookmarks lists in Adobe Acrobat. I find it allows people to jump around in the text much quicker. I used it in the PDF version of my book. It is automatically generated by LaTeX for every Chapter/Section in the book. Not sure if you can do that with Applixware. -- Bruce Momjian | http://candle.pha.pa.us pgman@candle.pha.pa.us | (610) 853-3000 + If your life is a hard drive, | 830 Blythe Avenue + Christ can be your backup. | Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania 19026
Bruce Momjian writes: > Also, shouldn't we be distributing PDF files rather than PS files. I > always considered PS files to be unportable because they assume you have > the same fonts with identical font spacing installed on your machine. > PDF embeds the fonts inside the file. PS is more appropriate for printing, PDF is better for browsing. But yet better for browsing is HTML, so there isn't much of a niche for PDF. > The other nifty feature of PDF files is bookmarks. They are pdfmarks > placed in the PS file which generates a bookmarks lists in Adobe > Acrobat. I find it allows people to jump around in the text much > quicker. I used it in the PDF version of my book. It is automatically > generated by LaTeX for every Chapter/Section in the book. Not sure if > you can do that with Applixware. If you use pdfjadetex then you'll get internal links. There's an example I just created at <http://www.postgresql.org/~petere/user.pdf>. (Coincidentally, I've just spent the afternoon upgrading jadetex and butchering my TeX installation to enlarge the internal tables.) The quality is okay, but it's not something I would sell. The line breaking has serious problems with long words (URLs, filenames), and some tables are way beyond good and evil. Of course you can just use ps2pdf and get no links. But then you don't really need the pdf. -- Peter Eisentraut peter_e@gmx.net http://yi.org/peter-e/
On Fri, 9 Feb 2001, Bruce Momjian wrote: > Also, shouldn't we be distributing PDF files rather than PS files. I > always considered PS files to be unportable because they assume you have > the same fonts with identical font spacing installed on your machine. > PDF embeds the fonts inside the file. > > The other nifty feature of PDF files is bookmarks. They are pdfmarks > placed in the PS file which generates a bookmarks lists in Adobe > Acrobat. I find it allows people to jump around in the text much > quicker. I used it in the PDF version of my book. It is automatically > generated by LaTeX for every Chapter/Section in the book. Not sure if > you can do that with Applixware. http://www.postgresql.org/users-lounge/docs/7.0/admin.pdf http://www.postgresql.org/users-lounge/docs/7.0/programmer.pdf http://www.postgresql.org/users-lounge/docs/7.0/tutorial.pdf http://www.postgresql.org/users-lounge/docs/7.0/user.pdf Only takes a minnit to create them. I'll put links up to them later. BTW, gotta have the ps version to create the pdf this way. Vince. -- ========================================================================== Vince Vielhaber -- KA8CSH email: vev@michvhf.com http://www.pop4.net 128K ISDN from $22.00/mo - 56K Dialup from $16.00/mo at Pop4 Networking Online Campground Directory http://www.camping-usa.com Online Giftshop Superstore http://www.cloudninegifts.com ==========================================================================
> Bruce Momjian writes: > > > Also, shouldn't we be distributing PDF files rather than PS files. I > > always considered PS files to be unportable because they assume you have > > the same fonts with identical font spacing installed on your machine. > > PDF embeds the fonts inside the file. > > PS is more appropriate for printing, PDF is better for browsing. But yet > better for browsing is HTML, so there isn't much of a niche for PDF. Yes, I realize that ghostscript requires PS to print. I usually print PDF's from inside PDF-viewer applications. However, I have never been comfortable that users are going to have the identical fonts with the same font metrics. If people stay with the standard Adobe 35 fonts, is that safe? My book had 52 fonts. Hard to imagine how anyone could use the PS file for the book. > > > The other nifty feature of PDF files is bookmarks. They are pdfmarks > > placed in the PS file which generates a bookmarks lists in Adobe > > Acrobat. I find it allows people to jump around in the text much > > quicker. I used it in the PDF version of my book. It is automatically > > generated by LaTeX for every Chapter/Section in the book. Not sure if > > you can do that with Applixware. > > If you use pdfjadetex then you'll get internal links. There's an example > I just created at <http://www.postgresql.org/~petere/user.pdf>. > (Coincidentally, I've just spent the afternoon upgrading jadetex and > butchering my TeX installation to enlarge the internal tables.) The > quality is okay, but it's not something I would sell. The line breaking > has serious problems with long words (URLs, filenames), and some tables > are way beyond good and evil. > > Of course you can just use ps2pdf and get no links. But then you don't > really need the pdf. Yes, LaTeX has a pdfmarks package that inserts the marks in the postscript file. -- Bruce Momjian | http://candle.pha.pa.us pgman@candle.pha.pa.us | (610) 853-3000 + If your life is a hard drive, | 830 Blythe Avenue + Christ can be your backup. | Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania 19026
Bruce Momjian writes: > Yes, LaTeX has a pdfmarks package that inserts the marks in the > postscript file. But we don't have the docs available in LaTeX format. The closest thing to it would be jadetex, in which case you'd use pdfjadetex to create PDF. -- Peter Eisentraut peter_e@gmx.net http://yi.org/peter-e/
> Bruce Momjian writes: > > > Yes, LaTeX has a pdfmarks package that inserts the marks in the > > postscript file. > > But we don't have the docs available in LaTeX format. The closest thing > to it would be jadetex, in which case you'd use pdfjadetex to create PDF. Just a question. Can you dump as SGML to Latex, then add the pdfmarks macro to the top of the file?. That may add the proper marks. -- Bruce Momjian | http://candle.pha.pa.us pgman@candle.pha.pa.us | (610) 853-3000 + If your life is a hard drive, | 830 Blythe Avenue + Christ can be your backup. | Drexel Hill, Pennsylvania 19026
Bruce Momjian writes: > Just a question. Can you dump as SGML to Latex, then add the pdfmarks > macro to the top of the file?. That may add the proper marks. I don't know of a way to convert DocBook to plain LaTeX. Jadetex is just a macro package on top of LaTeX in the same way as LaTeX is a macro package on top of TeX. That means what you have in mind should probably work. However, there's also pdfjadetex, which is a macro package on top of pdflatex, which is a macro package on top of pdftex, which does all the linking for you. There are also a number of other ways to create PDF from DocBook, including fot2pdf (first make a FOT from DocBook SGML) and PassiveTeX (which goes through XML). Endless room for experimentation for interested parties. ;-) -- Peter Eisentraut peter_e@gmx.net http://yi.org/peter-e/