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Historical note: In 1980-81, Brian Reid invented the Scribe markup language and processor, basically a predecessor to HTML and Markdown; a successor to RUNOFF;

Historical note: In 1980-81, Brian Reid invented the Scribe markup language and processor, basically a predecessor to HTML and Markdown; a successor to RUNOFF; and simpler than Knuth's then-recent TeX. Scribe led to Reid's getting the ACM's Grace Murray Hopper award. I used The Final Word's version of Scribe and Emacs to produce camera-ready copy for my first book. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scribe_(markup_language) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scribe_(markup_language)

svat 5y ago
In fact, the syntax of LaTeX (not TeX)—the idea of environments etc—is heavily based on Scribe: Leslie Lamport, who was a Scribe user, basically reimplemented parts of Scribe in TeX macros; the result was LaTeX. You can see the resemblance between Scribe's syntax: @Heading(The Beginning) @Begin(Quotation) Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start @End(Quotation) and LaTeX's. Lamport mentions Scribe a few times in this interview: https://tug.org/TUGboat/tb22-1-2/tb70lamp.pdf https://tug.org/TUGboat/tb22-1-2/tb70lamp.pdf > I don’t think TeX and LaTeX would have become popular had they not been free. Indeed, I think most users would have been happier with Scribe. Had Scribe been free and had it continued to be supported, I suspect it would have won out over TeX. On the other hand, I think it would have been supplanted more quickly by Word than TeX has been. (I'm not sure he's right; I think TeX/LaTeX benefited from both Knuth's concern for typographical excellence and Lamport's concern for authors' convenience, and the "book-quality printing" of TeX would have always had a place, but hard to say what would have happened.) [Edit: Changed "superficial syntax"; I just meant syntax as opposed to implementation details.]
- dctoedt 5y ago
  > the superficial syntax of LaTeX (not TeX) is heavily based on Scribe Interesting — I hadn't previously connected those dots; it's been years since I used Scribe and only recently did I start using LaTeX (mostly with org-mode as a front end, delving into LaTeX only as needed). Thanks for the link to the Lamport interview, which was illuminating.

svat 5y ago

In fact, the syntax of LaTeX (not TeX)—the idea of environments etc—is heavily based on Scribe: Leslie Lamport, who was a Scribe user, basically reimplemented parts of Scribe in TeX macros; the result was LaTeX. You can see the resemblance between Scribe's syntax: @Heading(The Beginning) @Begin(Quotation) Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start @End(Quotation) and LaTeX's. Lamport mentions Scribe a few times in this interview: https://tug.org/TUGboat/tb22-1-2/tb70lamp.pdf https://tug.org/TUGboat/tb22-1-2/tb70lamp.pdf > I don’t think TeX and LaTeX would have become popular had they not been free. Indeed, I think most users would have been happier with Scribe. Had Scribe been free and had it continued to be supported, I suspect it would have won out over TeX. On the other hand, I think it would have been supplanted more quickly by Word than TeX has been. (I'm not sure he's right; I think TeX/LaTeX benefited from both Knuth's concern for typographical excellence and Lamport's concern for authors' convenience, and the "book-quality printing" of TeX would have always had a place, but hard to say what would have happened.) [Edit: Changed "superficial syntax"; I just meant syntax as opposed to implementation details.]

dctoedt 5y ago
> the superficial syntax of LaTeX (not TeX) is heavily based on Scribe Interesting — I hadn't previously connected those dots; it's been years since I used Scribe and only recently did I start using LaTeX (mostly with org-mode as a front end, delving into LaTeX only as needed). Thanks for the link to the Lamport interview, which was illuminating.