[NCLUG] Linux DTP?

[Idris S Hamid]

On Tuesday 10 September 2002 16:09, Rich Young wrote:
> Hey, I'm looking at destop publiching packages, and a little web searching
> seems to point towards either Scribus or Lyx.  Anyone have any
> experience/advice on either, or other alternatives?
>
> FWIW, I don't know TeX/LaTeX, nor am I an experienced Pagemaker or Quark
> user.  But I'm relatively smart and capable of learning ;^)

If u're adventurous, then the ConTeXt macropackage
http://www.pragma-ade.com/
is the probably the best DTP system available today. It's still under very 
active development but feel free to join the ConTeXt mailing list where u'll 
get lots of help and advice.

LyX is good for some things (like a technical doctorate dissertation) but if u 
want advanced & total typographic control without having to do a whole lot of 
lower-level PlainTeX coding, then ConTeXt is the way to  go and it's much 
more flexible right out of the box than LaTeX (which was specifically 
designed in part to _restrict_ typographic control, at least right out of the 
box).

On the other hand, LaTeX is _much_ more popular, documented and supported 
(comp.text.tex is full of LaTeXperts) so you may want to start with LaTeX 
before getting into ConTeXt. I am a recent convert to ConTeXt from LaTeX but 
if u're totally new at this thing LaTeX is always the safest bet.

For TeX & LaTeX:
http://tug.org/

TeX FAQ:
http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html

LaTeX vs ConTeXt:
http://berend.gameren.nl/tex/

I have also written an advocacy article (draft version;->) on the advantages 
of TeX over commercial/proprietary DTP systems. See also ``Why TeX?'' at the 
same link:
http://www.mi.uib.no/~hansfn/tex/

I virtually live in the TeX universe and am heavily involved in some aspects 
of TeX research (like critical edition & Semetic-script typesetting). Feel 
free to contact me off-list; if you tell me exactly what it is u'd like to 
accomplish with a DTP I may be able to help identify the best TeX-based 
solution for your purposes.

Best wishes
Idris
-- 
Dr. Idris S Hamid
Department of Philosophy
Colorado State University
Fort Collins, CO 80523