[Note from moderator: Please cc: any expressions of interest to tac@mta.ca] TAC has been in existence now for 13 years. For about the first half of its existence, Bob did everything to get papers ready for publication. He did consult with me if he had particular tex problems. About when I retired, I took on the task of preparing papers (most of them) for publication. However I am uncomfortable with being the only one who really understands what is going on with tac.cls. I would like to find a volunteer to back me up, with a view to eventually taking over when the times comes, as it must, that I can no longer do the job. The job is not onerous. We get about 20 papers a year. On average, a paper takes a couple hours of preparation. Sometimes it is more, but often there is essentially no prep time since the author has used tac.cls and made no formatting errors. I am not planning on stopping this any time soon, but I think it is past time to prepare for the future. Michael
[Note from moderator: To reiterate: expressions of interest in the backup TeX editor position for TAC should be sent directly to Michael Barr, <barr@math.mcgill.ca>, and not to this mailing list. Thanks for those already sent. The TAC request that authors submit a single source file has nothing to do with archiving. Its purpose is to simplify slightly the editors' work.] Dear Mike, In response to your request for volunteers to take over the TeXnical management of TAC, I would certainly consider taking part in a committee to undertake this. I believe that I am qualified for the job. TeX has an error message, "Interwoven alignment preambles are not allowed", about which the TeXbook (p299) says, "If you have been so devious as to get this message, you will know what it means, and you will deserve no sympathy". I got it in about 1992, developing my diagrams package, and take it as my qualification to be a "TeXpert". There is, however, a condition, namely that TAC's use of LaTeX be brought up to date. In particular, macros should be separated in a modular fashion from mathematics. You insist on their being pasted in-line for the dubious reason of trying to archive papers as single files, whereas anybody else would use a directory (folder). Since I am making this offer in public, I would like to take the opportunity to point out to users of my diagrams package that version 3.91 has expired, and they should get a new one from www.PaulTaylor.EU/diagrams Also, even in V 3.91, the option "noPostScript" has been renamed "UglyObsolete", as a further attempt to get people to stop using the pre-1992 code that uses LaTeX-style diagonal lines. Best wishes, Paul Taylor
participants (2)
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Michael Barr -
Paul Taylor