Re: DOCBOOK-APPS: Re: need help with Passivetex errors (part 1 of 2))

[Sebastian Rahtz <sebastian.rahtz@computing-services.oxford.ac.uk>]

I am very aware that PassiveTeX has serious problems rendering tables.
It does do a plausible job if you supply column widths, of course,
but I don't think the Docbook stuff does this. In the TEI stylesheets
I work out column widths when I make FO.

My plan for PassiveTeX is to rewrite it to use ConTeXt instead
of LaTeX underneath. ConTeXt has many more smart things already
programmed in, including proper handling of HTML-like tables.
Sadly this will take me some time to get up to a useable state,
but I believe it is the only way to proceed.

An alternative to XSL FO + formatter for your average Docbook
user might be to typeset the XML directly using TeX. The xmltex
package on which PassiveTeX is built, or the support for XML
in ConTeXt, are both suitable for good formatting of things like
Docbook. http://www.hobby.nl/~scaprea/context may be of interest
thing, though I have not tried it.

PassiveTeX can and does make good quality PDF, within
its limited implementation of XSL FO. Unfortunately the Docbook
stylesheets use features of XSL FO which I don't always implement well
:-}
-- 
Sebastian Rahtz      OUCS Information Manager
13 Banbury Road, Oxford OX2 6NN. Phone +44 1865 283431