εχT_EX

εχT_EX aims at the development of a high quality typesetting system. This development is massively based on the experiences with the typesetting system T_EX. Despite of its age T_EX can still be considered a very good choice. Nevertheless design decisions which where reasonable at the time of the writing of T_EX can nowadays no longer be considered as state of the art.

The stability of T_EX is one of its virtues. On the other side it makes it hard to improve the system – even in the few areas which deserve improvements. The new millenium needs a system which is open for further development and at the same time compatible with T_EX as much as reasonable.

History

In December 2002 a small group of experts and developers came together to initiate the development of a new derivate of T_EX, based on NTS. Initially there were a few ideas and the necessity to familiarize with existing sources and T_EX extensions. After a lot of experiments and examinations, and yet before the group's first closed meeting from October 3^rd to 5^th 2003, it was clear that the ambitious goals could be achieved only if large parts of T_EX – and with it NTS – were replaced. This led to the decision to develop a new Java-based system, using the experiences of NTS, ε-T_EX, pdfT_EX, and Ω (Omega): εχT_EX.

Your Help is Welcome

During intensively discussions of the εχT_EX team about own and potential expectations about a new typesetting program, it became obvious that we could not completely evaluate all aspects. In several fields we were simply lacking necessary competence. Moreover there are more or less urgent wishes, especially from format and package developers, we did not think of at all so far.

We hope this page will help to get into discussions with people to tell us their wishes. It would be helpful however that important problems or ideas would be sent to us as soon as possible.

There are many fields where new concepts have to be developed. Here and on the plain implementation, support of any kind is welcome. Please contact us at extex@dante.de.

εχT_EX Mailing Lists

Three mailing lists are designated for discussions about εχT_EX:

• extex (general discussions in German, low traffic)
• extex-eng (general discussions in English, very low traffic at the moment)
• extex-devel (discussions about details of programming, mainly in German)