Re: scientific publishing process (was Re: Cost and access)

Eric, hello.

This is a bit of a side-issue, but...

On 2014 Oct 7, at 07:13, Eric Prud'hommeaux <eric@w3.org> wrote:

> * Luca Matteis <lmatteis@gmail.com> [2014-10-07 00:41+0200]
>> Sorry to jump into this once again but when it comes to typesetting
>> nothing really comes close to Latex/PDF:
>> http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/120271/alternatives-to-latex -
>> not even HTML/CSS/JavaScript
> 
> Making a floating model look like Latex/PDF at all resolutions seems
> impossible. Perhaps targeting a fixed (A4 or 8½×11 @300dpi) resolution
> is quite doable.

This isn't as hard as you might think (if I'm understanding you correctly).

At <http://purl.org/nxg/text/general-relativity> I have some lecture notes.  The downloads there include:

    http://www.astro.gla.ac.uk/users/norman/lectures/GR/part2.pdf
    http://www.astro.gla.ac.uk/users/norman/lectures/GR/part2-usletter.pdf
    http://www.astro.gla.ac.uk/users/norman/lectures/GR/part2-screen.pdf

Those come from the _same_ source file with different \documentclass options (I keep meaning to do something about the marginal notes in the screen version, but have never got around to it).  There's no resolution/DPI problem, because these are all vector fonts, not bitmaps.  There's should be no 'missing font' problem because the fonts are automatically embedded properly (the maths font in those documents is a commercial one, so it's unlikely to be on your computer).

This won't dynamically reflow, it's true (and that's a pity), but if I ever get a tablet computer, I doubt I'll be able to resist producing versions in a layout which is targeted at that size of screen.

All the best,

Norman


-- 
Norman Gray  :  http://nxg.me.uk
SUPA School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Glasgow, UK

Received on Tuesday, 7 October 2014 09:57:34 UTC