The meeting place was the architecturally stunning First Nations Longhouse Building of the campus of the University of British Columbia in Vancouver where ninety-five TEX enthusiasts gathered together for TUG '99, the 20th annual meeting and conference of the TEX Users Group, August 15-19, 1999.
There were many interesting
talks
on new developments and techniques for untangling
the web of communications in the TEX world; lively
panel discussions,
vendor presentations, and lots of networking
and swapping of TEX ideas amongst the participants themselves.
We were treated to a unique and beautiful Metafont Apocalypse Poster Exhibition on the creative use of METAFONT and TEX through the kind courtesy of Alban Grimm, professor of Writing in Mainz, Germany.
There was a Special Recognition Award to a well-known but rarely seen TEX guru, Donald Arseneau, for his outstanding contribution of macro packages to the TEX community.
At the Closing Banquet, it was decided that there ought to be a prize for best paper. A poll of several non-disinterested (!) people was taken by Christina Thiele (proceedings editor and hence the one who had had to read all the papers at least once!) and after six people, the choice was still a tie! So, in recognition--by their peers--of exceptional presentation and content, Jean-luc Doumont and D. P. (Don) Story were the joint winners of Best Paper. Their prizes? A wee bottle of Russian vodka, courtesy of Irina Makhovaya, of Mir Publishers (Moscow).
Barbara Beeton has been on TUG's board since it was first begun in 1979, and was called the TUG Steering Committee. Her role at that time: `Wizard of Format Modules'. Since that time, many roles, many committees, and one unchanging resolve: that TeX and its users be well served and well represented. In recognition of her long-standing contributions to TUG's board--and her endurance!--the TUG President, Mimi Jett, presented Barbara with a bottle of Russian vodka (vodka bottles seemed to flow like water at this meeting!).
Led and cajoled by the pied-poet of Oxford, Sebastian Rahtz,
the group headed towards the Rose Garden overlooking the Pacific,
for an impromptu session
of delightful
Poetry Reading
at sunset on Wednesday evening.
This year, the
TUG99-web Preprints
version of the talks is available
in pdfLaTEX thanks to the diligent work of
Ross Moore.
It has hyperlinks to the program schedule of the TUG'99 meeting and
you can navigate through the schedule
in the order of each presentation just as if you were present at the
meeting. It is an interesting and intricate example of the use of
pdfLaTEX. An article on how to prepare documents for TUGboat in
pdfLaTEX will be forthcoming.
Take a moment to check out the new
Most of the digital photos were graciously provided by Warren Leach of Blue Sky Research. The rest by Kiren Bahm. of the TUG Office. If any of you (participants) have photos that you would like to add please write to us and let us know. The souvenir photo album can be expanded to link to photos on your website or be posted directly here. This is a live webpage that will be updated ``as time permits.'' We welcome your contributions and suggestions. The TUGboat production team (TUGboat@tug.org) are also looking for photographs to print (in black and white) in the proceedings edition of TUGboat.
We thank all of you who came and contributed to the success of the meeting by your participation. Those of you not lucky enough to have been there, sorry you missed the fun, but hope you will enjoy seeing some of the highlights which will bring back fond memories for the attendees.
Next year, the 21st annual meeting, TUG 2000, will take place at Wadham College, Oxford, England, August 13th - 16th, 2000. We hope to see you there!
In the meantime, happy (La)TEXing!
