[tex-live] Re: Omega 1.15

Sebastian Rahtz sebastian.rahtz@computing-services.oxford.ac.uk
Wed, 29 May 2002 23:38:34 +0100


On Thu, May 30, 2002 at 02:20:40AM +0430, Roozbeh Pournader wrote:
 
> I am just hoping, and I feel a little responsiblity, since I am a Unicode
> insider. There are only a few Unicode insiders still interested in
> TeXities, and they are three times busier than me.
 
I feel a lot of sympathy here, those twin notions of

 a) No-one else seems interested in TeX
 b) I feel responsible for persuading at least some of them
 ....

> > I don't think John or Yannis are at all interested in making user-level
> > distributions.....
> 
> No, they're not. I even can't understand why they are continuing Omega in
> such a way. Why they are releasing it.

that is academics for you. all is sacrificed to the god of Research.
 
> I don't plan. I just do small things. I dream something like typesetting a
> Persian Unicode XML document using XSL-FO with a TeX-based engine (let's
> call that Omega). 

let's not forget that that you need a macro package to do the FO work
as well. My hopes are now pinned on ConTeXt. I despair of PassiveTeX
(and I am allowed to, cos I maintain it)
 
> If that starts to use a lot of resources without any apparent output, I
> will stop, and head somewhere else. And these are as divergent as hinting
> outlines with FontLab, organizing a local Linux Users Group, writing
> proposals for Unicode characters needed for proper encoding of Koran,
> reporting bugs to Microsoft for their problematic Persian support in
> Internet Explorer, or attending a meeting on Internationalized Domain
> Names.

If I was advising you, I'd say "drop the first two". others
will do it.

-- 
Sebastian Rahtz      OUCS Information Manager
13 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 6NN. Phone +44 1865 283431