"Code Sandwiches"

[Nick Sabalausky]

"retard" <re at tard.com.invalid> wrote in message 
news:ilbo57$31ie$1 at digitalmars.com...
> Thu, 10 Mar 2011 01:18:53 -0500, Nick Sabalausky wrote:
>
>> "Jonathan M Davis" <jmdavisProg at gmx.com> wrote in message
>> news:mailman.2409.1299728378.4748.digitalmars-d at puremagic.com...
>>> On Wednesday 09 March 2011 13:30:27 Nick Sabalausky wrote:
>>>> But why is it that academic authors have a chronic inability to
>>>> release any
>>>> form of text without first cramming it into a goddamn PDF of all
>>>> things? This is one example of why I despise Adobe's predominance: PDF
>>>> is fucking useless for anything but printing, and no one seems to know
>>>> it. Isn't it about time the ivory tower learned about Mosaic? The web
>>>> is more than a PDF-distribution tool...Really! It is! Welcome to the
>>>> mid-90's. Sheesh.
>>>
>>> And what format would you _want_ it in? PDF is _way_ better than having
>>> a file
>>> for any particular word processor. What else would you pick? HTML?
>>> Yuck. How
>>> would _that_ be any better than a PDF? These are _papers_ after all,
>>> not some
>>> web article. They're either written up in a word processor or with
>>> latex. Distributing them as PDFs makes perfect sense.
>>
>> They're text. With minor formatting. That alone makes html better. Html
>> is lousy for a lot of things, but formatted text is the one thing it's
>> always been perfectly good at. And frankly I think I'd *rather* go with
>> pretty much any word processing format if the only other option was pdf.
>>
>> Of course, show me a pdf viewer that's actually worth a damn for viewing
>> documents on a PC instead of just printing, and maybe I could be
>> persuaded to not mind so much. So far I've used (as far as I can think
>> of, I know there's been others), Acrobat Reader (which I don't even
>> allow on my computer anymore), the one built into OSX, and FoxIt.
>>
>>
>>> And yes, most of these papers are published in print format as their
>>> main form
>>> of release. You're usually lucky to be able to get a PDF format instead
>>> of having to have bought the appropriate magazine or book of papers
>>> from a particular conference.
>>>
>>>
>> I'm all too well aware how much academics considers us unwashed masses
>> lucky to ever be granted the privilege to so much as glance upon any of
>> their pristine excellence.
>
> You clearly have no idea what you're talking about. If you want to
> publish your results in a peer reviewed conference, which is often a
> requirement for further funding if you happen to depend on it, then you
> MUST adopt to their guidelines. This paper is a TR, it probably does not
> even go through a (peer) review process.
>

If so, then that paper doesn't need to be restricted to PDF. But regardless, 
my complaints about PDF usually being the only option were directed at 
academic papers in general, not just this particular one.


> Usually you're asked to publish your conference paper using a standard
> document template, but you're not allowed to republish the paper
> elsewhere.

Oh, I see. That makes it perfectly clear that the academic world is *not* 
interested in restricting access to information. After all, what could 
possibly be more open and free than being required to send your work to an 
obscure publisher with minimal visibility who then says you can't 
redistribute your own work to a wider audience? Or maybe it's not about 
restricting access to information at all - maybe they're just stupid and 
can't see what's happening. Could that be it? Or is it 
arbitrarily-restricted access?


> Ever read proceedings where every paper uses
> different formatting? It doesn't look professional.
>

I never said that a collection of works shouldn't be able to use a 
consistent style for what's contained within. I was only talking about 
internet distribution of individual articles.


> Now, another point against HTML or DOC or something similar is that you
> can't really tell what it looks like when printed.

How often do people print a document from the web to read it? And as for 
mass-printing to distrubute in hardcopy, I've been saying from the start 
that PDF (AFAIK) is fine for printing.


> Also one of the biggest
> problems is that there's a maximum number of pages allowed. Extra pages
> cost money due to printing costs. With HTML or DOC you can't be sure how
> the system that prints the paper organizes all figures and line wrapping.
> Usually it fails and you get bad quality.

Since when are PDF and HTML mutually exclusive?


> You should also take a look at
> this wrt html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justification_(typesetting)

I'm familiar with justified text.