General

In the UK-TUG inbox recently was a mail from Karl Berry (TUG President) with information about upcoming deadlines for TUG 2009 in Notre Dame, Indiana. Karl said:

TUG 2009 will take place in Notre Dame, Indiana, from July 28–31. See http://tug.org/tug2009 for the registration form, maps, the proposals already accepted, and more.

April has several deadlines related to the conference:

• April 13: deadline for abstract submissions; see
  http://tug.org/tug2009/cfp.html for the call for papers.Although we may be able to accept proposals after the deadline, of course potential attendees would like to know what they’ll be seeing . So if you’d like to give a talk, please try to submit an abstract by the 13th.
• April 17: deadline for bursary applications; see
  http://tug.org/bursary for information and the application form. No late applications will be accepted.
• April 27: deadline for the early bird registration discount. After this, the registration fee will be increased. Register for the conference at http://tug.org/tug2009/register.html (it will redirect you to Notre Dame’s web site).

Hope to see you there!

Work is progressing on the first issue of Baskerville for some time, under the editorial control of Jonathan Webley.  For the upcoming issue, Jonathan is very much finding his way with what is required: he hopes to provide some Guidelines for Authors in due course. But that doesn’t mean that potential contributors should wait before sending in draft articles. Ideas or indeed articles are encouraged by e-mail to baskerville@uk.tug.org. Articles on any area of TeX or related topics are very welcome: the Committee is particularly keen to publish user articles with a UK “flavour”.

We will be using a Creative Commons license for Baskerville contributions. This makes most sense both for UK-TUG and authors, and reflects the open nature of TeX. More details can of course be obtained from Jonathan. Publication of articles in Baskerville won’t cost you anything, with the flip side being that you won’t make anything either (other than a warm glow from contributing to the community!).

UK-TUG maintains a membership directory, containing names and e-mail addresses of members who are happy for these details to be shared. Members of UK-TUG who have asked to receive the list should find it in their e-mail inboxes today. If you were expecting to receive the directory but did not, please contact membership@uk.tug.org.

Our website hosting company are moving all of their servers to Manchester from London tomorrow evening (Thursday February 26th). We are told that everything will be off-line for around seven hours.

Jonathan Fine, current Chair of UK-TUG, has been elected to the board of TUG.

The first call for papers for BachoTeX 2009 arrived in the UK-TUG Committee inbox this week.

BachoTeX 2009 — Call for Papers

Dear TeXies, TeX friends and lovers of fine typography —

This is an invitation to BachoTeX 2009, the XVIIth Polish TeX Users Group Conference.

As usual, it will be held at the traditional TeXies’ and GUST meeting place, Bachotek near Brodnica, in the north-east of Poland, from April 29 until May 3, 2009 inclusive.

We are again trying to get a glimpse of the future, whence the conference title:

TeX: at a turning point, or at the crossroads?

The community is putting a lot of effort and thought into possible strategies for promoting and developing TeX and related products for the foreseeable future, including :

• TeX, and TeX-based engines
• enhanced graphics engines
• new or improved macro packages
• user interfaces
• new fonts

Work progresses in many different directions, and thus there is clearly hope for an ever better future, even though the more pessimistic may wonder whether TeX represents an evolutionary dead-end.

In this context the feedback between users and developers of new tools and engines is immensely important — it might decide whether within a few years we will be looking back at today as a successful turning point or as a bad decision at the crossroads of TeX’s history.

Some say that they have never believed that conference themes/mottos have any impact on submissions anyway. We, the Program Committee, think otherwise; please help us to prove our point! Although we do not restrict what your presentations should be about, we would be more than happy if your contribution will be user-centric and oriented towards the future of TeX with special emphasis on the needs, hopes and dangers.

Proposals (abstracts) should be e-mailed to the Program Committee, which listens at the address of papers-2009 at gust dot org dot pl. Bogusław Jackowski is the appointed chairman. Also, please note the “Call for TeX Pearls” below.

Especially welcome are proposals for TeX-related tutorials or introductions. If you have suggestions for tutorials or workshops by others than yourself or about specific topics, please let us know.

The deadline for abstracts and other proposals is the March 8th. The deadline for final papers will soon be published at the conference web site:

http://www.gust.org.pl/BachoTeX/2009

Recovery from stress

Exhausted TeXies will get a chance to recover their intellectual powers during nightly musical sessions, usually at a bonfire. Participate by bringing your own instruments (and voices)! Nature fans will have the opportunity to enjoy the unspoiled features of the Bachotek lake and surrounding woods :

http://www.gust.org.pl/bachotex/2008/gallery/andrzej-odyniec/20080502_122214_DSC0116.jpg

The conference could also be a family event — the conference site is an enclosed area with a safe and attractive playing ground for children and parents alike :

http://www.gust.org.pl/bachotex/2008/gallery/andrzej-odyniec/20080502_192247_DSC0150.jpg

http://www.gust.org.pl/bachotex/2008/gallery/andrzej-odyniec/20080501_161111_DSC0065.jpg

Please make the most of the opportunity !

Call for TeX Pearls

We are continuing the tradition of “The Pearls of TeX Programming”. Here, briefly, is what is wanted:

• short TeX, MF or MP macro(s)
• results must be useful, and the solution not obvious
• easy to explain : 10 minutes at most

If you have something that fits the bill, please consider submitting a proposal. If you know of somebody’s work that does the same, please let us know, and we will contact that person. Other details and previously collected Pearls can be found at

http://www.gust.org.pl/projects/pearls/

The email address is: pearls at gust dot org dot pl

Our old site used to have the audio of an interview with Donald Knuth hosted on the site.  The piece is available from the NPR website directly here.

The Committee are slowly organising older information on the web server, which is not currently visible.  The first set of useful files to be sorted out are slides from the 2006 Living and Working with LaTeX workshop. The following slides are available:

• Jonathan Fine: Avoiding problems, Solving problems, Asking for help, and the handout version
• Peter Flynn: Sorry, Professor, the dog ate my thesis, and the handout version
• Nicola Talbot: Writing a Thesis in LaTeX: hints, tips and advice

There is also a demonstration document “Green and Tao snipped”  as a PDF and as the source.

Sorry for the loss of the website earlier today. The database server at our hosts (Prime Hosting) was misbehaving.  Hopefully everything is working well again now!

EuroTeX 2009 takes place this year in Holland in late August/early September. The focus of the meeting is on Educational uses of TeX (such as manuals and teaching materials).

The fee for UK-TUG members is €350, which includes everything except the excursion day (which costs €75). In particular it includes accommodation and meals. If you book and pay before February 1st there is a €100 discount (and possibly a better exchange rate): see the registration page.