[tex-eplain] Problem with marks and \doublecolumns

[Laurence Finston]

Hi Karl,

> I'll look into it as soon as I have a chance, unless by some fantastic
> chance someone else gets into it first ... --best, karl.

Thanks.

A couple of things occurred to me:

Firstly, I originally only set the \mark for entries (i.e., the titles of "productions" and the songs in that production) when the first letter
of the title changed, that is, once for "A", once for "B", etc.  I then used \topmark for the letter on the left side of the headline.  However, this didn't work.  If the \mark wasn't getting reset by \output, I think it should have.

In the version I posted, \mark is set for each new entry.  Since each entry is put into a \vbox, each page begins with a new entry.  Therefore \firstmark works in the heading.

I think it would be nicer if the first version, with \topmark, would work. However, if the multiple columns macros use \output, I doubt that it would be possible to solve this problem with a reasonable amount of effort.  I'd be happy to be proven wrong, though.

The second thing that occurred to me is that I could insert a \columnfill in the appropriate place in the final version of the document.  I tried this and it works, i.e., the columns are balanced and the headline remains correct.

However, since 'productions.tex' and most of the other TeX files are generated by a program, this wouldn't be a very satisfying solution.  It would probably be possible to solve the problem by collecting the entries found on a page into a \vbox and measuring the latter each time and inserting a \columnfill appropriately.  I think this is sort of a kludge, but it might be better than trying to change the multiple column macros so they don't clobber the \mark.

Best wishes,

Laurence

> Gesendet: Samstag, 07. August 2021 um 22:51 Uhr
> Von: "Karl Berry" <karl at freefriends.org>
> An: Laurence.Finston at gmx.de
> Cc: tex-eplain at tug.org
> Betreff: Re: [tex-eplain] Problem with marks and \doublecolumns
>
>     Subject: [tex-eplain] Problem with marks and \doublecolumns
>
> Hi Laurence - thanks for the report and the test document. I don't have
> any ideas offhand, unfortunately.
>
> I'll look into it as soon as I have a chance, unless by some fantastic
> chance someone else gets into it first ... --best, karl.
>