[texhax] learning tex vs latex

[Uwe Lück]

See the UK TeX FAQ

     http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html?label=texthings

for what I earlier wrote about bill lam's ambigous term `tex' -- Uwe.

At 16:47 28.10.09, Uwe Lück wrote:
>At 03:03 28.10.09, bill lam wrote:
>>I'm unfamiliar with both tex and latex. Should my time better spent on
>>learning tex or latex?  Presumably learning curve of tex is even more
>>steeper than that of latex, but I saw some forum members said they use
>>plain tex.  I would like to know before deciding,
>>
>>1. Do common packages such as supertabular and cjk work on tex?
>>2. Some said latex is actively developing while tex is not, is that
>>    true?
>>3. What will be the advantage of plain tex over latex?
>
>LaTeX is a script-like user interface to the binary TeX program, i.e., 
>Knuth's versions up to TeX3, or extensions of the latter, most notably: 
>e-TeX, pdfTeX, XeTeX.
>
>Plain TeX is kind of an alternative user interface to TeX, but with a few 
>exceptions, it is just a part of LaTeX. ... "in a silent way", however: 
>plain TeX code is present in the LaTeX source latex.ltx, but usual LaTeX 
>documentation doesn't mention it. Plain TeX and LaTeX are called "formats".
>
>When you are writing `tex', it is not quite clear whether you are 
>referring to the binary or to the format Plain TeX. This confusion seems 
>to lurk in other postings.
>
>Books like The TeXbook or TeX for the Impatient describe the binary engine 
>as well as the Plain TeX format, both is missing in usual LaTeX documentation.
[...]
>>1. Do common packages such as supertabular and cjk work on tex?
>
>They work when you use the TeX engine with the LaTeX format. They usually 
>don't with Plain TeX only (running the TeX engine). miniltx.tex can extend 
>Plain TeX so some more packages that usually are "LaTeX" packages can be used.
>
>>2. Some said latex is actively developing while tex is not, is that true?
>
>At 06:35 28.10.09, Pierre MacKay wrote:
>>It is nonsense to speak of LaTeX as developing, while TeX is not.  LaTeX 
>>is a macro package built on top of TeX.  It can not "develop" in the 
>>sense of altering the basic engine, because Donald Knuth has taken great 
>>care to ensure archival compatibility for all input files that ever ran 
>>in TeX3.
>
>Well, some call obvious truths "nonsense", maybe thinking `don't waste 
>your time with saying things that everybody knows' (not saying this 
>outright instead of just thinking, probably they consider it too obvious 
>to waste their time with also saying it).
>
>Knuth's TeX3 engine does not develop anymore, due to Knuth's decision.
>
>At 06:35 28.10.09, Pierre MacKay wrote:
>>If a package requires something that cannot be run in the basic TeX3 
>>engine, it may not be called TeX.
>
>What may not be called TeX?
>
>I mentioned extensions of TeX like e-TeX, pdfTeX, XeTeX. There are LaTeX 
>packages that require running such an extension of the TeX program. Their 
>development may not have stopped as definitely as TeX's, but this point is 
>quite irrelevant.
>
>>2. Some said latex is actively developing while tex is not, is that true?
>
>Considering the confusion of `TeX' with `plain TeX', a point in saying 
>this is that many people work on improving LaTeX by either improving the 
>standard macros or by writing own LaTeX packages for new features, and by 
>improving their own packages. There seems to be almost no development of 
>Plain TeX in this sense.