Hi there, after more than five years using LaTeX (Lambda and XeLaTeX, this one for the last months), I have decided to give ConTeXt a try. LaTeX is fine for me: I have typeset my own dissertation in Philosophy (with ancient Greek and Unicode) and a couple of books. But the modular design makes things tricky at the end, and I would like to give ConTeXt (with XeTeX and LuaTeX when it comes) a try. At the same time, I would like to switch from TeX to XML. TeX is fine, but XML is better for other than typographical purposes. Coming from the humanities, I guess the right choice is TEI (P5 is expected to be released before middle of the following year). I had some experience with XML and Docbook some years ago, but that was before I switched to Linux and Docbook aims to technical documentation (and I'm not a technical guy). I guess I can mix ConTeXt and XML with the eXaMpLe framework (I have just read about it at wiki.contextgarden.net). In order to understand TEI and ConTeXt, I would like to be able to create the files that will be able to compile an TEI XML document with ConTeXt without having to convert it to ConTeXt. I would like to avoid XSL and XSL-FO. I guess it should be something similar DocbookInConTeXt, but I don't know whether it uses the eXaMplE framework (I don't even know whether . Could anyone comment on this topic? I mean, whether the described task could be achieved with ConTeXt, which issues may arise, whether this is the best approach to the issue, whether I miss something, and so on. Thanks for your help, Pablo
� wrote:
I guess I can mix ConTeXt and XML with the eXaMpLe framework (I have just read about it at wiki.contextgarden.net). In order to understand TEI and ConTeXt, I would like to be able to create the files that will be able to compile an TEI XML document with ConTeXt without having to convert it to ConTeXt. I would like to avoid XSL and XSL-FO. I guess it
Context can process XML directly, and for normal docs the related testing and programming features are ok; complex tree transformation can best be doen with xslt (luatex may change this); there is an xsl-fo processing available in context but i wonder if it has ever been used for serious work; fo is not that suited for quality typesetting and the regular machinery in context is producing better result and faster too
should be something similar DocbookInConTeXt, but I don't know whether it uses the eXaMplE framework (I don't even know whether .
the example framework is some ongoing experiment with web related tex/xml things; you don't need that, just stick to the built in xml handler (as described in example.pdf, but more extensive examples can be found in the x-*.tex files in the distribution
Could anyone comment on this topic? I mean, whether the described task could be achieved with ConTeXt, which issues may arise, whether this is the best approach to the issue, whether I miss something, and so on.
most of the projects we run at pragma involve xml -> pdf processing; using a dedicated dtd works most convenient using tei is ok, as long as you stick to structural elements and keep away from layour-related coding Hans ----------------------------------------------------------------- Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com | www.pragma-pod.nl -----------------------------------------------------------------
Hans Hagen wrote:
should be something similar DocbookInConTeXt, but I don't know whether it uses the eXaMplE framework (I don't even know whether .
the example framework is some ongoing experiment with web related tex/xml things; you don't need that, just stick to the built in xml handler (as described in example.pdf, but more extensive examples can be found in the x-*.tex files in the distribution
Could anyone comment on this topic? I mean, whether the described task could be achieved with ConTeXt, which issues may arise, whether this is the best approach to the issue, whether I miss something, and so on.
most of the projects we run at pragma involve xml -> pdf processing; using a dedicated dtd works most convenient
using tei is ok, as long as you stick to structural elements and keep away from layour-related coding
Thanks for your answer, Hans. Sorry for not answering before (these days I find myself installing a new computer and moving data into it). It seems that the task is more difficult than I thought (although x-contm.tex seems a very interesting example to begin with). But my problem right now is ConTeXt itself. My PhD thesis (that was typeset with LaTeX [for the examination board], Lambda [for the electronic publication] and XeLaTeX [just for fun ;-)]) contains quotes and some fragments in ancient Greek. And I would like to be able to do similar things (in a fancier way, of course ;-)) with ConTeXt. For those ones who were newbies not so long ago or that come from a humanities background, which are the best documents to start learning ConTeXt? Thanks for your help, Pablo
On Nov 7, 2006, at 9:20 PM, Pablo Rodríguez wrote:
It seems that the task is more difficult than I thought (although x-contm.tex seems a very interesting example to begin with).
But my problem right now is ConTeXt itself. My PhD thesis (that was typeset with LaTeX [for the examination board], Lambda [for the electronic publication] and XeLaTeX [just for fun ;-)]) contains quotes and some fragments in ancient Greek. And I would like to be able to do similar things (in a fancier way, of course ;-)) with ConTeXt.
For those ones who were newbies not so long ago or that come from a humanities background, which are the best documents to start learning ConTeXt?
Thanks for your help,
Pablo
Difficult to answer this question because it's a bit vague. What kind of documents do you want to produce with ConTeXt? Articles, presentations, textbooks, lists, interactive screen documents? But to give you a few pointers that may or may not be useful: - The first stop would be the wiki http://wiki.contextgarden.net . There is a section called "Sample documents" that may be a good starting point. - You could have a look at recent issues of the PracTeX journal; there is some stuff about ConTeXt in there, and it should be good for beginners. - Of course, the Pragma website, but I guess you know that already. - Finally, for ancient Greek, there is the ancientgreek module http:// modules.contextgarden.net/t-greek which I find superior to all Greek typesetting in LaTeX (because I wrote the module). Don't hesitate to ask here when you have specific questions, but maybe that can get you started. I am a humanities guy and do all my work in ConTeXt... HTH Thomas
Thomas A. Schmitz wrote:
On Nov 7, 2006, at 9:20 PM, Pablo Rodríguez wrote:
For those ones who were newbies not so long ago or that come from a humanities background, which are the best documents to start learning ConTeXt?
Difficult to answer this question because it's a bit vague. What kind of documents do you want to produce with ConTeXt? Articles, presentations, textbooks, lists, interactive screen documents?
Many thanks, Thomas, for your reply. Maybe the issue here is that I want to learn how to do things in ConTeXt that I was able to do with LaTeX. But this may be the wrong approach to ConTeXt (because this might not be a good way to learn ConTeXt using LaTeX as the background example). I want ConTeXt to produce mainly articles and textbooks (after learning that it will be easy to figure out presentations). I know some references, but I don't know which are the best ones. BTW, are “ConTeXt, an excursion” and “ConTeXt the manual” good introductions to start with ConTeXt or are they (too) outdated?
But to give you a few pointers that may or may not be useful:
Thanks, they are useful.
- The first stop would be the wiki http://wiki.contextgarden.net . There is a section called "Sample documents" that may be a good starting point.
- You could have a look at recent issues of the PracTeX journal; there is some stuff about ConTeXt in there, and it should be good for beginners.
- Of course, the Pragma website, but I guess you know that already.
- Finally, for ancient Greek, there is the ancientgreek module http:// modules.contextgarden.net/t-greek which I find superior to all Greek typesetting in LaTeX (because I wrote the module).
With this particular topic, I'm not sure whether I fully understand what you mean. For me, input and output must be Unicode (it is the best way to avoid problems) and this can be done with XeTeX. I don't know how good the integration with ConTeXt is, but for me and before LuaTeX is released in an stable version, XeTeX is the only way of dealing with fonts in TeX. Is there something in your Greek module that cannot be done with XeTeX?
Don't hesitate to ask here when you have specific questions, but maybe that can get you started. I am a humanities guy and do all my work in ConTeXt...
Actually, I knew that you were the person I wanted to ask about this. Some time ago, I read somewhere (on the web) that you switched to ConTeXt, after having to edit a book with Word. And then I discovered that you teach Classics at Bonn. Then, if the question is not too personal (it hope not, but sorry if it is): how did you learn ConTeXt? Only tinkering with already existing modules? Did you read any manuals? (Again, if this is not too personal, I assume that our interests in ConTeXt are similar, although I'm not a classicist and I don't belong to the academia) Thanks for your help, Pablo
On Nov 8, 2006, at 8:35 PM, Pablo Rodríguez wrote:
Many thanks, Thomas, for your reply.
Maybe the issue here is that I want to learn how to do things in ConTeXt that I was able to do with LaTeX. But this may be the wrong approach to ConTeXt (because this might not be a good way to learn ConTeXt using LaTeX as the background example).
No, I think this approach is what many users do. As long as you don't insist that you want exactly the same syntax etc, as in LaTeX :-)
I want ConTeXt to produce mainly articles and textbooks (after learning that it will be easy to figure out presentations). I know some references, but I don't know which are the best ones.
BTW, are “ConTeXt, an excursion” and “ConTeXt the manual” good introductions to start with ConTeXt or are they (too) outdated?
Most of the basic stuff is still correct, so they should be good starters.
But to give you a few pointers that may or may not be useful:
Thanks, they are useful.
- The first stop would be the wiki http://wiki.contextgarden.net . There is a section called "Sample documents" that may be a good starting point.
- You could have a look at recent issues of the PracTeX journal; there is some stuff about ConTeXt in there, and it should be good for beginners.
- Of course, the Pragma website, but I guess you know that already.
- Finally, for ancient Greek, there is the ancientgreek module http:// modules.contextgarden.net/t-greek which I find superior to all Greek typesetting in LaTeX (because I wrote the module).
With this particular topic, I'm not sure whether I fully understand what you mean. For me, input and output must be Unicode (it is the best way to avoid problems) and this can be done with XeTeX. I don't know how good the integration with ConTeXt is, but for me and before LuaTeX is released in an stable version, XeTeX is the only way of dealing with fonts in TeX. Is there something in your Greek module that cannot be done with XeTeX?
I must admit that I've been too lazy to really test XeTeX, so I may be wrong here. You can use Unicode input with the module; the only difference would be that you have to wrap all Greek passages in \localgreek{} commands or \start ... \stop pairs. I guess XeTeX provides proper hyphenation for Greek, but - the module has support for more fonts than XeTeX; - does XeTeX allow relative scaling of fonts? Anyway, only Hans and Taco know to what extent I will have to rewrite everything when luatex and support for OpenType fonts are there.
Don't hesitate to ask here when you have specific questions, but maybe that can get you started. I am a humanities guy and do all my work in ConTeXt...
Actually, I knew that you were the person I wanted to ask about this. Some time ago, I read somewhere (on the web) that you switched to ConTeXt, after having to edit a book with Word. And then I discovered that you teach Classics at Bonn.
Then, if the question is not too personal (it hope not, but sorry if it is): how did you learn ConTeXt? Only tinkering with already existing modules? Did you read any manuals? (Again, if this is not too personal, I assume that our interests in ConTeXt are similar, although I'm not a classicist and I don't belong to the academia)
Thanks for your help,
Pablo
Yes, I started with already existing modules, and it took me a while (and lots of help here on the list) to write my own code. I never actually read any manual cover to cover, but the big manual is almost always open on my computer for reference. I just finished typesetting a book with ConTeXt, complete with dozens of cross-references, indexes, bibliography. Nothing very complicated, but it's wonderful to see that things work. There are still two or three problems, but they are fairly harmless. I love donig my own presentation styles with ConTeXt and metafun. The more I use ConTeXt, the more amazed I am... Hope this can inspire you a bit Thomas
Sorry for not having answered before, Thomas.
- Finally, for ancient Greek, there is the ancientgreek module http:// modules.contextgarden.net/t-greek which I find superior to all Greek typesetting in LaTeX (because I wrote the module).
Is this module contained in the standard ConTeXt distribution or has it to be downloaded separately? After reading the the three files contained in the module. I wonder whether they provide hyphenation for Greek. Do they?
I must admit that I've been too lazy to really test XeTeX, so I may be wrong here. You can use Unicode input with the module; the only difference would be that you have to wrap all Greek passages in \localgreek{} commands or \start ... \stop pairs. I guess XeTeX provides proper hyphenation for Greek, but - the module has support for more fonts than XeTeX; - does XeTeX allow relative scaling of fonts? Anyway, only Hans and Taco know to what extent I will have to rewrite everything when luatex and support for OpenType fonts are there.
XeTeX allows relative scaling of fonts.
Yes, I started with already existing modules, and it took me a while (and lots of help here on the list) to write my own code. I never actually read any manual cover to cover, but the big manual is almost always open on my computer for reference. I just finished typesetting a book with ConTeXt, complete with dozens of cross-references, indexes, bibliography. Nothing very complicated, but it's wonderful to see that things work. There are still two or three problems, but they are fairly harmless. I love donig my own presentation styles with ConTeXt and metafun. The more I use ConTeXt, the more amazed I am...
Hope this can inspire you a bit
Yes. Tinkering (and asking in the mailing list ;-)) is the way of learning. I have discovered the “Typographic Programming” document style.pdf) which seems very interesting, but unfortunately it is far for being complete. And I guess Hans is too busy to finish this book anytime soon. Thanks, Pablo
On Tue, 7 Nov 2006, Pablo Rodríguez wrote:
Hans Hagen wrote:
should be something similar DocbookInConTeXt, but I don't know whether it uses the eXaMplE framework (I don't even know whether .
the example framework is some ongoing experiment with web related tex/xml things; you don't need that, just stick to the built in xml handler (as described in example.pdf, but more extensive examples can be found in the x-*.tex files in the distribution
Could anyone comment on this topic? I mean, whether the described task could be achieved with ConTeXt, which issues may arise, whether this is the best approach to the issue, whether I miss something, and so on.
most of the projects we run at pragma involve xml -> pdf processing; using a dedicated dtd works most convenient
using tei is ok, as long as you stick to structural elements and keep away from layour-related coding
Thanks for your answer, Hans. Sorry for not answering before (these days I find myself installing a new computer and moving data into it).
It seems that the task is more difficult than I thought (although x-contm.tex seems a very interesting example to begin with).
You can also check the thread http://archive.contextgarden.net/thread/20050225.103441.cda2d788.en.html#200... for some discussion on getting started with XML and context.
But my problem right now is ConTeXt itself. My PhD thesis (that was typeset with LaTeX [for the examination board], Lambda [for the electronic publication] and XeLaTeX [just for fun ;-)]) contains quotes and some fragments in ancient Greek. And I would like to be able to do similar things (in a fancier way, of course ;-)) with ConTeXt.
For those ones who were newbies not so long ago or that come from a humanities background, which are the best documents to start learning ConTeXt?
There is also Berend de Boer's Latex in proper context that can help in the transition. http://articles.contextgarden.net/article/32 Aditya
On Tue, 7 Nov 2006 17:34:54 -0500 (EST), Aditya Mahajan
On Tue, 7 Nov 2006, Pablo Rodríguez wrote:
Thanks for your answer, Hans. Sorry for not answering before (these days I find myself installing a new computer and moving data into it).
It seems that the task is more difficult than I thought (although x-contm.tex seems a very interesting example to begin with).
You can also check the thread http://archive.contextgarden.net/thread/20050225.103441.cda2d788.en.html#200... for some discussion on getting started with XML and context.
Since this thread is also talking about some tools, I'll complete the list with dbcontext (http://dblatex.sf.net) on which I contribute, that translates DocBook to ConTeXt via XSL stylesheets. I guess that many aspects could be directly handled by context. Here are some examples built from DocBook sources: http://dblatex.sourceforge.net/example/svn-book-by-dbcontext.pdf, http://dblatex.sourceforge.net/example/divepython-dbc.pdf.bz2. Regards, BG
nico wrote:
On Tue, 7 Nov 2006, Pablo Rodríguez wrote:
Thanks for your answer, Hans. Sorry for not answering before (these days I find myself installing a new computer and moving data into it).
It seems that the task is more difficult than I thought (although x-contm.tex seems a very interesting example to begin with).
Since this thread is also talking about some tools, I'll complete the list with dbcontext (http://dblatex.sf.net) on which I contribute, that translates DocBook to ConTeXt via XSL stylesheets. I guess that many aspects could be directly handled by context.
Thanks for your answer. I know that XML can be converted to TeX/LaTeX/ConTeXt using XSL, but my XML is TEI (http://www.tei-c.org/) and not DocBook. If I would use XSL transformation, I guess it would be easier (at least for me) to adapt the already existing TEI-XML->LaTeX XSL files and adapt them to ConTeXt. I wonder (out of ignorance) whether this would be a better way than parsing the XML directly with ConTeXt. Thanks, Pablo
On Wed, 08 Nov 2006 20:53:37 +0100, Pablo Rodríguez
nico wrote:
On Tue, 7 Nov 2006, Pablo Rodríguez wrote:
Thanks for your answer, Hans. Sorry for not answering before (these days I find myself installing a new computer and moving data into it).
It seems that the task is more difficult than I thought (although x-contm.tex seems a very interesting example to begin with).
Since this thread is also talking about some tools, I'll complete the list with dbcontext (http://dblatex.sf.net) on which I contribute, that translates DocBook to ConTeXt via XSL stylesheets. I guess that many aspects could be directly handled by context.
Thanks for your answer. I know that XML can be converted to TeX/LaTeX/ConTeXt using XSL, but my XML is TEI (http://www.tei-c.org/) and not DocBook. If I would use XSL transformation, I guess it would be easier (at least for me) to adapt the already existing TEI-XML->LaTeX XSL files and adapt them to ConTeXt. I wonder (out of ignorance) whether this would be a better way than parsing the XML directly with ConTeXt.
I have no experience with handling XML directly with context, but I guess it's the most elegant way of processing, since it relies upon only one tool (no XSLT processor, no stylesheet, no glue to pass the output to texexec), there is no intermediate step, and the code should be smaller. But for me the drawback is that you need a good perception about how context/tex works (things about grouping, how macros expand and other funny things) and debugging might be harder. At least XSL gives an output that you can tweak until something compiles and gives the expected output :-) The other thing is that there are some specific processings that I have no idea how it can be implemented with context. This said, I know there are many people who happily process their XML docs directly with context. Maybe they could also give their feedback. Regards, BG
Aditya Mahajan wrote:
On Tue, 7 Nov 2006, Pablo Rodríguez wrote:
For those ones who were newbies not so long ago or that come from a humanities background, which are the best documents to start learning ConTeXt?
There is also Berend de Boer's Latex in proper context that can help in the transition.
Thanks for the answer, Aditya. I have read it. It helps and it could be supplemented with http://wiki.contextgarden.net/From_LaTeX_to_ConTeXt (I guess there are some things not contained in the original article). Pablo
participants (5)
-
Aditya Mahajan -
Hans Hagen -
nico -
Pablo Rodríguez -
Thomas A. Schmitz