>context has its own otr, but it's not that hard to set up a layout that >matches plains dimensions, although it's 'work inprogress' there is a more >of less abstract otr interface where you can plug in your own otr
I believe this is the most important problem for porting EDMAC >>Is the ConTeXt output routine more easily accessed/modified? Will it be >>easier to port EDMAC to ConTeXt than to LaTeX (which I have wanted to do 4 >>some time) or vice versa? > >depends on what the spec is; what exactly does edmac provide? is there a >more or less specification + examples? EDMAC is here: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/~ucgadkw/edmac/index.html Here is a sample: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/~ucgadkw/edmac/features.pdf EDMAC provides the following: 1. automatic stepped (e.g., every line, every 2 lines, every 5 lines) line numbering, by page or by chapter; 2. sub-lineation within the main series of line numbers; 3. variant readings or other information automatically keyed to line numbers; 4. multiple series of footnotes and endnotes; 5 are provided, though adding more is relatively easy (I've added 2 series of marginal notes as well); 5. block or columnar (2 or 3 columns) formatting of footnotes; 6. a number of useful macros and work arounds for fine tuning everything; 7. cross-referencing capabilities, crop marks and endnotes EDMAC is implemented as follows: 1. commands for starting and ending line numbering in a section of text; 2. Next comes the machinery for writing and reading the auxiliary file for each section that helps us count lines, and for creating list macros encoding the information from that file (Section~\ref{lineation}); this auxiliary file will be read at the start of each section, to create those list macros, and a new version of the file will be started to collect information from the body of the section; 3. Next are commands for marking sections of the text for footnotes. The basic format is \text{<lemma>}<commands>/ The \meta{lemma} argument is the lemma in the main text: "\text" both prints this as part of the text, and makes it available to the \meta{commands} you specify to generate notes. 4. EDMAC then implements macros that take each paragraph apart, attach the line numbers and insertions, and send the result to the vertical list. 5. Next are footnote commands: regular, pragraphed, and columnar 6. EDMAC has its own otr: It's really not that complicated. It adds basically two things to the Plain otr: 1. crop marks shipout 2. footnotes shipout I think the main problem in porting EDMAC to ConTeXt or LaTeX is modifying the otr (maybe I'm wrong). Both LaTeX and ConTeXt (I think) have crop mark capabilities so that this and other minor features of EDMAC can be discarded in a port. 7. cross-referencing and endnotes macros r provided last. The above does not do justice to EDMAC. John Lavagnino and Dominik Wujastyk have paid a lot of attention to detail. EDMAC does not provide routine layout capabilities, so one has to do a lot of Plain TeX programming to get the rest of the critical edition in order, like any other Plain book. I think that a combination of the EDMAC with an excellent layout macro-format such as ConTeXt or that provided by the LaTeX memoir class (perhaps the best thing to happen to LaTeX in years) would be a phenomenal step forward in the greater goal of combining the power of TeX with ever greater usability. Unfortunately the EDMAC manual, which excellently documents the entire implementation, must be purchased from UK TUG. On the other hand, edmac.tex/doc does have the entire manual in commented form. I'll ask John and Dominik if they would be willing to make it available as a no-print pdf if anyone is interested in this. For anyone interested in learning advanced TeX, it's an excellent text. The motivation behind virtually all macros is given, and some of the tricker code (all too frequent) is explained as well. Thnx 4 your response. Best wishes Idris
