[texhax] inconsistency between pdftex and tex

Philip TAYLOR [PC87S-O/XP] P.Taylor at Rhul.Ac.Uk
Fri Oct 17 18:05:08 CEST 2003


P.S. The simplest form of the wording that I can find
is in Don's "TeX.web", where he writes :

"[T]he official name `\TeX' by itself is reserved
 for software systems that are fully compatible with each other.
 A special test suite called the ``\.{TRIP} test'' is available for
 helping to determine whether a particular implementation deserves to be
 known as `\TeX' [cf.~Stanford Computer Science report CS1027,
 November 1984]."

I would argue (indeed, I do!) that the key phrase here is
"software systems that are fully compatible with each other";
by deliberately interpreting a leading comment as a pragmat,
the software earlier cited is behaving in a manner which is
/not/ compatible with Knuth's reference version, and therefore
should not be called "TeX".

** Phil.


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