[tug-consult] Toward a TeX Live book publishing scheme and website

[Barry MacKichan]

It might be of some interest to this group that *Scientific Word* is now 
free and open-sourced. The URL for those who want to download it is 
https://github.com//scientificword/sciword. The source code is at 
https://github.com//scientificword/mozilla. The version of *Scientific 
Word* on github is 6.1.2.

There are bugs, but it is generally usable. If the project attracts 
enough interest and manpower, we should be able to fix the bugs. Much of 
the program is data-driven, so adding support for new packages and new 
macros is feasible for those familiar with LaTeX. The conversion of 
LaTeX to XHTML is specified by TeX macros; the conversion of XHTML to 
LaTeX is done with XSLT that generates TeX. The tags for environments, 
lists, paragraphs, and text appearance are given in an XML document, and 
so can be extended without rewriting code.

This is the only program from MacKichan Software which has been made 
open source since *Scientific WorkPlace* and *Scientific Notebook* use 
code that was licensed from MathWorks and is not ours to give away.

The manuals for all the products are available at 
https://www.mackichan.com/techtalk/v60/1002updatesv6.htm (the 
installation programs on that page are for customers who have purchased 
one of our products, and the installation requires a serial number; use 
the link in the first paragraph above for the version without any copy 
protection). All of the manuals were prepared with *Scientific Word*.

— Barry MacKichan

On 4 Jun 2022, at 18:06, Lloyd R. Prentice wrote:

> Dear TeX consultant,
>
> Help us reach out to more than 1.6 million self-publishers in need of 
> your professional guidance.
>
> TUGboat editor Karl Berry and Marc Worrell, lead developer of the 
> Zotonic CMS, and I are working to develop a TeX Live package scheme 
> curated for self-publishers and a website to make it as easy as 
> possible for self-publishers to style and typeset their books with 
> LaTeX.
>
> Karl suggests that this list is the best place to get expert help in 
> developing a list of must-have LaTeX packages for serious 
> self-publishers and to identify best-of-the-best LaTeX tutorials and 
> resources.
>
> I’ve listed below a first cut of candidate book styling packages to 
> include in the scheme. No doubt there are many more dependencies and 
> utility packages that warrant inclusion.
>
> Please help us flesh out the list with the can’t-do-without book 
> styling packages in your toolkit.
>
> Naive selection criteria: Packages that are as easy as possible for 
> self-publishers to understand and use. E.g., Given existing 
> documentation, can a TeX-naive self-publisher use this package to 
> style a book—fiction, nonfiction, technical, academic?
>
> That’s quite subjective. So we much need your professional 
> experience to identify any and all packages that deserve inclusion. 
> And if documentation is a problem, perhaps you can help us with tat.
>
> We also invite your thoughts and suggestions re content and 
> presentation of the website. Submission of how-tos and tutorials would 
> be much welcome—an excellent vehicle to promote your consulting 
> practice.
>
> Our hope is that the TeX Live-based book publishing scheme plus clear 
> and simple installation instructions will make it easier and faster to 
> install TeX Live while reducing disk footprint. We further hope that 
> tutorials and resource links in the website will make LaTeX a more 
> attractive typesetting option for self-publishers.
>
> We will, of course, include consultants listings in the resource 
> section.
>
> Bowkers tells us that 1,677,781 ISBNs were assigned to self-published 
> titles in 2018. That’s up 461,438 ISBNs in 2013. And that’s in the 
> U.S. alone. Yes, a large percentage of these books were ebooks. But 
> still…
>
> https://www.bowker.com/siteassets/files/pdf-files/bowker-selfpublishing-report-2019.pdf
>
> How many of these books were typeset with LaTeX? Fair guess, very few. 
> Why? Safe bet— too little understanding of the benefits of LaTeX and 
> too few noobie how-tos and tutorials explicitly written to help 
> self-publishers publish better books.
>
> Our hope is that we can bring new blood and enthusiasm into the LaTeX 
> community. With your help, perhaps we can.
>
> All the best,
>
> Lloyd R. Prentice
>
> Primary packages
>
> Package beaulivre
> Write your books in a colorful way
> https://ctan.org/pkg/beaulivre
>
> Package book
> A class for typesetting books
> https://ctan.org/pkg/book
>
> Package elegantbook
> An Elegant LATEX Template for Books
> https://ctan.org/pkg/elegantbook
>
> Package koma-script
> A bundle of versatile classes and packages
> https://ctan.org/pkg/koma-script
>
> Package memoir
> Typeset fiction, non-fiction and mathematical books
> https://ctan.org/pkg/memoir
>
> Package novel
> Class for printing fiction, such as novels
> https://ctan.org/pkg/novel
>
> Package octavo
> Typeset books following classical design and layout
> https://ctan.org/pkg/octavo
>
> Package scrbook
> Koma-Script ‘book’ class
> https://ctan.org/pkg/scrbook
>
> Package simplivre
> Write your books in a simple and clear way
> https://ctan.org/pkg/simplivre
>
> Package tufte-latex
> Document classes inspired by the work of Edward Tufte
> Last modified in Catalogue: 2018-04-05 06:35
> https://ctan.org/pkg/tufte-latex
>
> Package willowtreebook
> Easy basic book class, built on memoir
> https://ctan.org/pkg/willowbook
>
> Package zztex
> A full-featured TEX macro package for producing books, journals, and 
> manuals
> https://ctan.org/pkg/zztex
>
> Dependencies?
>
> Utilities?
>
> lualatex
>
> latexmk
> Fully automated LATEX document generation
> https://ctan.org/latexmk
>
> Non English packages?
>
> Publisher-sponsored packages?
>
> Sent from my iPad


-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://tug.org/pipermail/tug-consult/attachments/20220606/87bd1c97/attachment-0001.html>