-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1
Captain's log. We received a signal from Stephen Harris on StarDate
23/10/05 06:18. Translated to English it stated:
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Roy Schestowitz" <r@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> To: "Roy" <r@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Sent: Saturday, October 22, 2005 8:28 PM
> Subject: Re: generating pdf files
>
>
>> Well, I recently indeed found out (and can confirm) that different
>> routes to generating the PDF's led to different outcomes. This was quite
>> worrying, to me at least. Now I have to fiddle and experiments with
>> outputs, just to ensure all is fine.
>>
>>
>
> I think that fonts are platform-independent so that if one uses
> standardly included fonts that should not be a problem.
Actually, I have seen cases in the past where certain fonts on one
platform appeared coarser on another. Use uncommon fontsets with
caution, I'd say...
> However, I read there is a right way and a wrong way to create pdfs
> from (la)tex. The author says the following method always works.
> http://tools.omnipress.com/shared/pdfsupport/convertlatex.asp
>
> correct method: dvips -P pdf example.dvi
>
> and he says the wrong way is: dvips example.dvi examplebit.ps
>
> and he says pdflatex works well if the figures are compatible;
I have never looked at LaTeX at that low level. I try to avoid it, in
fact. I just hope that LyX developers will adapt the command as required...
> 3. "LaTeX and pdfLaTeX behave by default differently concerning the
> character-spacing. As a result, the same TeX-File compiled with LaTeX
> and pdfLaTeX may show different line-breaks, paragraphs, page-breaks
> etc. Fortunately, there is a switch in pdfLaTeX to ensure LaTeX spacing."
>
> But one doesn't need to worry about this by using his "correct" method.
> The webpage provides an explanation and example files. I got your dup.
I am beginning to worry more and more as I continue to read these
discussions. In my mind, PDF's were intended to just be uniform and the
conversion from TeX a very natural one. I might add, however, that
Microsoft's ways are flawed too.
> P.S. I think this quote may apply to finding a perfect grammar rule app:
>
> http://www.cis.udel.edu/~case/colt.html John Case's COLT Page
> "Consider the problem of finding a rule for generating a sequence of
> numbers such as 9, 61, 52, 63, 94, 46, 18, 1, 121, 441, ... . Here is a
> rule for this sequence. First compute the squares of successive integers
> beginning with 3, but, then, to generate the sequence, use, in place of
> these squares, the squares each with its decimal digits written down in
> reverse order (ignoring any lead zeros). N.B. This rule can be written
> as a formal algorithm (or computer program). The problem of finding such
> rules gets harder as the sequences to generate get more complicated than
> the one above. Can the rule finding itself be done by some computer
> program? Interestingly, it is mathematically proven that there can be no
> computer program which can eventually find (synonym: learn) these
> (algorithmic) rules for all sequences which have such rules!"
Descending to the level of granularity where Turning machines are
involved is more like Knuth's inclinations, I suppose. It was
interesting, however, for me to discover that generation of a PDF varies
in terms of output. It should not be an arbitrary choice or what that's
motivated by compilation time.
Roy
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.2.2-rc1-SuSE (GNU/Linux)
iD8DBQFDWzEoU4xAY3RXLo4RAoBbAKCf6HTm0rk5+TFR0Bwn4Q87BtCvDACffFCb
vJ+U2o5JHpQvv2A/aHXo6Xs=
=0OiM
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
|
|
