Reading on Reading

Why do even type guys insist on doing the TEX thing? It’s so ugly. If I say my company’s name always has to be outline-shadowed, will people do it? Tex, and Latex – that is how I will write them. If Knuth wants to come kick the crap out of me, let him through.

That “E” was supposed to be subscripted. Oh, well.

That has always bugged me, too. It's like the way people used to type "Apple ][" and "Apple ///" to imitate the logo designs on those machines. I think Knuth did it because he wanted to show off the kind of tricky formating that could be done automatically in Tex.

If I say my company’s name always has to be outline-shadowed, will people do it?

Uh...actually, yes, if you go to the trouble of saying so in a company style guide.

I think he means in the text of articles, books, etc. about Tex. It would be like a business magazine always setting the name "Exxon" with the second "x" shifted down whenever the name is used.

It depends. Are you writing news or ad copy? The logo may be TeX with a dropped e but when used in print, go with Tex.

More…

Regarding the I'M!!!A!!!NEAT!!GUY!! example, I say that Charo should be allowed to spell her name with an exclamation point, if only one person is allowed to do it.

As for the actual topic, I say the line is somewhere other than where this admittedly pedantic guy is placing it, because geekery like TeX has a long history of sprouting entire new words and spellings. So, while people like Colin and Walsh might object to the dropped "E", others will argue just as hard that it's the proper way to do it. Write it out however the hell you want.

Why do I get myself all worked up about nitpicky things like this? There's the classic email vs. e-mail, as well, which Knuth has also chimed in on, I believe.

Oh, well. I think the tendency over time is for things to normalize, so if TeX became common knowledge, it'd probably become Tex real quick. I just hate this "let's break the rules to stand out" artist/ad agency mindset.

That dropped E is way more trouble than it's worth if you're using anything but Tex or Latex, since there are \tex and \latex macros that do it for you.

I guess it just seems trendy, and I hate marketing trends. Why did they go with ExxonMobil instead of Exxon-Mobil? It's trendy.

In regard to specifying a certain "style" for typesetting: let's look at the fine example that musician Prince (or more correctly, the artist formerly known as Prince) showed us, whereby people were forced to get a new character-symbol to even mention his name!?

In regard to the exclamation point thing: I am a good example of changing the system--as my name is "kc!" (with lowercase k lowercase c and an exclamation point). All my corporate co-workers have a fun time integrating that one into email messages and the like, but it is definately possible. ...sometimes is it just fun to tweak people's minds out on such a small detail. :P

Why did they go with ExxonMobil instead of Exxon-Mobil?

Well, just think of the productivity gains! They can save billions of keystrokes each year!

I guess I shouldn't talk though, the name of the company I work for is only "properly" written with all caps (but it's not an acronym, oh no).

First, I'm grateful for and gratified by the mention here---thanks! I do have one further improvement to make before declaring the design finalized and going on (hopefully) to update all my pages to match it.

Second, I'm kind of bummed that my choosing to make \TeX explicit in a fairly decorative bit of text (the italics in the subhead at the top), while I didn't even use the logotype for the listing for DEK's _The TeXbook_ and I even followed Philipp Lehman's style in setting ``latex'' in all lower-case (though I mislike how his doing that in his text makes it awkward to look for specific program references in it).

Third, fwiw, funky stylings like this do help somewhat in searching for things...

Fourth, did I really manage to find almost everything?

William