Re: [Groff] Typesetting Software

[Ralph Corderoy]

Tadziu Hoffmann wrote:
> > Formatting directives in LaTeX are much more verbose. If you really
> > have to type all that stuff (instead of using editor shortcuts or
> > what else) it gets in the way a bit.
> 
> I don't think this is really an issue.  I find that when working on a
> document, only 10% of the time is actually taken up by text entry, 90%
> consists of editing already-entered text (and shifting stuff around
> etc.), and most of this editing regards the text proper, not the
> formatting.  Thus I would say that learning to use your text editor
> efficiently will benefit you much more than saving a couple of
> keystrokes on a markup tag.

True.  But the other side of LaTex being more verbose is that it's extra
noise when trying to read the underlying text.  With troff's macro
invocation at the start of the line I find it's quite easy to skip the
macro name entirely when coming across, e.g. a .B, in the middle of a
output paragraph but at the start of the source line.

Cheers,


Ralph.