Thanks so much for the help! Pleas 1, 2, 5, and 6 are completely solved. (In particular, Mojca, the fix for accents is fantastic!) I wasn't able to get \Frowny to work any better with the advice provided, but I found that when I scaled it down, it stopped knocking the text off the grid, and I have a hard time telling the difference in size between the old and new.
% New (works) :
\useexternalfigure[frowny][Frowny][factor=7,type=pdf]
\def\Frowny{\hbox{\externalfigure[frowny]}}
\useexternalfigure[smiley][Smiley][factor=7,type=pdf]
\def\Smiley{\hbox{\externalfigure[smiley]}}
\useexternalfigure[slashy][Slashy][factor=7,type=pdf]
\def\Slashy{\hbox{\externalfigure[slashy]}}
I'm currently working on the Table of Contents formatting. I'm trying to format it as follows:
\starttable[|r|c|l|]
subjectName · pageNumber\MR
subjectName · pageNumber\MR
...etc...
\stoptable % Of course, where I don't actually input it subject by subject like this.
Ideally, I'd like to be able to position the table on the page by deciding where the center line of single dots is (eg a setup where the dots are in the very center of the page layout or another setup where they are two-thirds of the textblock/pagelayout size (I'm not sure what the correct term is here) to the right).
I've tried a number of different ways to set this up. This is the only thing close to what I want that I can get to work, but of course, it doesn't have the dots aligned:
\def\ListCommand#1#2#3%
{
\starttabulate[|r|c|l|]
\NC #2\NC ·\NC #3
\stoptabulate
}
\def\TableOfContents
{
\placelist[section]
[criterium={chapter,subject}, alternative=command,
command=\ListCommand]
}
Here's an example of what I tried to do but which doesn't work:
\def\ListCommandOne#1#2#3%
{#2\NC}
\def\ListCommandTwo#1#2#3%
{·\NC}
\def\ListCommandThree#1#2#3%
{#3\NC}
\def\TableOfContents
{
\starttabulate[|l|l|l|]
\NC
\placelist[section]
[criterium={chapter,subject}, alternative=command,
command=\ListCommandOne]
\NC
\placelist[section]
[criterium={chapter,subject}, alternative=command,
command=\ListCommandTwo]
\NC
\placelist[section]
[criterium={chapter,subject}, alternative=command,
command=\ListCommandThree]
\stoptabulate
}
Obviously that attempt—aside from not working—is incredibly un-elegant and could quickly screw things up with misaligned names and page numbers. Here is another attempt:
\def\ListCommand#1#2#3{#2 · #3\MR}
\def\TableOfContents
{
\starttable[|r|c|l|]
\placelist[section]
[criterium={chapter,subject}, alternative=command,
command=\ListCommand]
\stoptable
}
I think part of my problem is that I really don't understand what placelist {\em is} or what it is doing. Is this something that would be clearer only if I knew more about plain Tex?
Note: I'm putting \TableOfContents in the frontmatter.