On 5/28/13 12:06 PM, Arthur Reutenauer wrote:
Under your comparison, C is LaTeX, and an object file is TeX (I don't
care about the dvi right now).
That doesn't make any sense. TeX is a program, you can't compare it
to a file format. A comparison that would make more sense is that C is
TeX, the object file is TeX's hash table (that is usually not dumped on
file), and up to now you've not really used TeX itself, but a macro
package, LaTeX, that provides a convenient user interface to it.
Since I am not a TeX user, I compared the "LaTeX output/under the hood"
to an object file.
However, I find the translation from C to object much easier: the
number of segments in an object files roughly compares to the number
of functions contained in the original source code. It seems that
LaTeX commands are much more complex than I've thought.
That's because they're macros, and -- presumably -- you've only used
the high-level user interface up to now. Hence you seem disturbed by
the fact that LaTeX defines many more commands that you've used until
now; but you shouldn't. If you look at LaTeX's source code it should be
much clearer.
I have tried, but it's not like what I expected. I know how to walk
through a program in source code, because that's what I'm accustomed to:
I find LaTeX's source code very different, I find myself wandering
around without any clear and sharp indication on a "main".
I guess I will read the TeX book, first.
Cheers!
