3 ms·
> It is not completely clear why Knuth felt it necessary to develop software not only for typesetting but also for font design. Probably he considered them asp
by dhosek 3y ago
> It is not completely clear why Knuth felt it necessary to develop software not only for typesetting but also for font design. Probably he considered them aspects of the same problem. However, legend states that he insisted on creating his own fonts in response to the ghastly fonts that had been used in the first printings of his early publications. This possibility has been adduced as evidence that Concrete Mathematics was in fact published before, not after, The METAFONTbook.
I laughed out loud at this one.
- tzs 3y agoI remember after Knuth finished designing fonts that he was happy with and people were starting to expect he'd get back to work on the next volume of TAoCP now that he was happy with typesetting and fonts one of the major computer magazines (Dr. Dobb's or Byte I think) published an article in the April issue that said TAoCP was again delayed because Knuth was not happy with the ink and was designing a program to develop better ink formulations.
- macintux 3y agoFor anyone who hasn’t stumbled upon it, this is an amazing read. Donald Knuth - The Patron Saint of Yak Shaves - https://yakshav.es/the-patron-saint-of-yakshaves/ https://yakshav.es/the-patron-saint-of-yakshaves/ Discussions: - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29861678 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29861678 - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15733381 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15733381
- Beldin 3y agoFrom the "TeX -yak shaves": > The Moral of the Story Whenever you feel like “can’t we just replace this whole thing, it can’t be so hard” when handling TeX, don’t forget... To bring a razor.