re XPL, DLG, etc.

[OkAnnie@xxxxxxxx]

TBaehr wrote: "In almost *all* cases, it was my experience as a
writer and as a III+ enthusiast that informed my work. Some of
the features include the log/restore system, outlining (with true
alignment on the periods, which to my knowledge *no* one else can
do), and some desktop publishing features like dropped caps that
were under development when I left. Features like these
(granted, not everyone needs them) are difficult bordering on
impossible from the command line."

Only someone unfamiliar with typesetting systems could make such
a profoundly inaccurate statement as the last about these
features. Command-driven dropped caps and every other familiar
typographic convention predated menus and dialog boxes and are no
more "difficult" than anything else in xyWrite. v3 is hard to use
for typographic detail not because it is command-driven but for
reasons like having no provision for a carriage return with no
linefeed
(i.e., 0 linespacing) or autotab command (indents at a position
calculated internally from the position where entered; useful for
many purposes, not least: Type the cap you want to drop, set the
autotab and number of lines you want it to indent--default: all
lines till cancelled, change type size to body, and subsequent
text is indented the width of the char). Nothing personal, but I
question the wisdom of hiring people with no typographic
experience to write DLG instead of building sorely needed basic
commands into the code.

Standardizing xyWrite on PostScript back in the '80s in
collaboration with, e.g., the Billerica software PS interpreter
developer Custom Applications (I believe the name was) would have
been a bold and brilliant move that would have placed the
responsibility for drivers--including a screen driver for a
graphical preview--on the PS developer and have let XyQuest
concentrate on getting the most from the typographic system that
quickly became the publishing industry standard. (Software PS
interpreters print PS code to any dm, inkjet, or laser printer.)
xyWrite by now would support EPS import and
Bitstream would be unknown to xyWrite users because we'd use only
top-quality
Type 1 fonts. As it is, apparently both Billerica operations are
history and the farther xyWrite gets from its typographic roots
to meet the perceived needs of business (with more and more CUI),
the sloppier it gets.

Art Campbell's v4 macros book, btw, breaks no ground. Strictly for
DisplayWrite immigrants (ha!), written for Signature, and quickly
revised to change the name (usually) to xyWrite 4.  --annie

========================== annie fisher  nyc