[TUHS] TeX and groff (was: roff(7))

Mary Ann Horton mah at mhorton.net
Wed Jan 12 11:19:04 AEST 2022


I recall attending a TeX lecture by Knuth around 1981. He said he wasn't 
satisfied with the character layout from other formatting programs, 
which drove him to write TeX. He illustrated in great detail the kerning 
and exact placement of the font characters next to each other. I 
couldn't tell the difference, but clearly it was very important to him. 
He wanted his documents to look perfect.

On 1/10/22 12:33 PM, Larry McVoy wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 10, 2022 at 01:00:15PM -0600, Blake McBride wrote:
>> 2.  Looking at the output, it is my opinion that TeX produces
>> better-looking documents.
> It's a double edged sword.  TeX looks better but you instantly know it is
> TeX, it has a particular look.  Troff looks just fine to me, and you don't
> know it is Troff, Word, or what.


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