4 ms·

The Errors of TeX [pdf] (1989)

62 points by gus_leonel 2y ago

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
Syzygies 2y ago
I too kept a log of my errors in the 1980's, hoping to become a better C programmer. I imagined that with careful enough reflection, I would never make the same mistake twice. I found the log many years later. Last entry: "Forgot to eat. Got sick."
bluenose69 2y ago
Why is it that pretty much everything Knuth writes is wildly detailed but yet, somehow, deeply engaging? Maybe I'm such a fan because of many great experiences with tex (and latex). The output is just so beautiful. And the notation (once you get used to the backslashes etc) is so clean. But, heck, I got hooked when I studied Figure 12 of [1], as an undergraduate leafing through a math journal. At first, I thought "what's wrong with this nutcase, those "s" letters all look fine to me". Then I started to see differences. And then some looked ugly. That one in the middle, though, looked better and better, the more I studied the figure. Pretty soon, I was hooked. 1. Knuth, Donald E. “Mathematical Typography.” Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. (N.S.) 1, no. 2 (March 1979): 337–72.
bombcar 2y ago
Ok. Knuth makes mistakes, nice to know. Let's read about them. Oh, he categorizes them nicely. WAIT A MINUTE HE HAS A LIST OF CATEGORIES FROM A-T THAT ARE NAMED TO COINCIDE WITH THE LETTER! And they alliterate!
- taeric 2y ago
  Knuth is delightfully fun in pretty much all he does. Read his manuals for TeX, where he has exercises. And consider his versioning schemes.
morning-coffee 2y ago
While enjoying that read, I kept thinking along the way "I wish the original TeX source of this PDF were available somewhere as I'd love to see this rendered for my high resolution display the way Knuth intended."
- taeric 2y ago
  I'd be surprised if you couldn't find the sources?
- svat 2y ago
  It's linked in another comment, but repeating anyway: a high-resolution PDF (i.e. using vector fonts and not a scan) of the error log itself is available here: https://mirrors.ctan.org/info/knuth-pdf/errata/errorlog.pdf https://mirrors.ctan.org/info/knuth-pdf/errata/errorlog.pdf (typeset from source: https://mirrors.ctan.org/systems/knuth/dist/errata/errorlog.tex https://mirrors.ctan.org/systems/knuth/dist/errata/errorlog....) The 37-page paper that precedes the error log, The Errors of TeX, has been reprinted (as always, with minor corrections) as Chapter 10 of the book of collected papers titled Literate Programming https://cs.stanford.edu/~knuth/lp.html https://cs.stanford.edu/~knuth/lp.html — Knuth has not published its .tex source, though it's not impossible to find…
WillAdams 2y ago
While not an article, a more recent listing (current as of 15 January 2021) is: https://ctan.math.washington.edu/tex-archive/info/knuth-pdf/errata/errorlog.pdf https://ctan.math.washington.edu/tex-archive/info/knuth-pdf/... and he also keeps track of errors in his books: https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/books.html https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/books.html and issues certificates for the Bank of the Island of San Seriffe for finding them (used to be physical checks --- I got one for an error and a minor point of improvement in his book on _Digital Typography_).

62 points by gus_leonel 2y ago

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

I too kept a log of my errors in the 1980's, hoping to become a better C programmer. I imagined that with careful enough reflection, I would never make the same mistake twice. I found the log many years later. Last entry: "Forgot to eat. Got sick."

bluenose69 2y ago

Why is it that pretty much everything Knuth writes is wildly detailed but yet, somehow, deeply engaging? Maybe I'm such a fan because of many great experiences with tex (and latex). The output is just so beautiful. And the notation (once you get used to the backslashes etc) is so clean. But, heck, I got hooked when I studied Figure 12 of [1], as an undergraduate leafing through a math journal. At first, I thought "what's wrong with this nutcase, those "s" letters all look fine to me". Then I started to see differences. And then some looked ugly. That one in the middle, though, looked better and better, the more I studied the figure. Pretty soon, I was hooked. 1. Knuth, Donald E. “Mathematical Typography.” Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. (N.S.) 1, no. 2 (March 1979): 337–72.

bombcar 2y ago

Ok. Knuth makes mistakes, nice to know. Let's read about them. Oh, he categorizes them nicely. WAIT A MINUTE HE HAS A LIST OF CATEGORIES FROM A-T THAT ARE NAMED TO COINCIDE WITH THE LETTER! And they alliterate!

taeric 2y ago
Knuth is delightfully fun in pretty much all he does. Read his manuals for TeX, where he has exercises. And consider his versioning schemes.

morning-coffee 2y ago

While enjoying that read, I kept thinking along the way "I wish the original TeX source of this PDF were available somewhere as I'd love to see this rendered for my high resolution display the way Knuth intended."

taeric 2y ago
I'd be surprised if you couldn't find the sources?
svat 2y ago
It's linked in another comment, but repeating anyway: a high-resolution PDF (i.e. using vector fonts and not a scan) of the error log itself is available here: https://mirrors.ctan.org/info/knuth-pdf/errata/errorlog.pdf https://mirrors.ctan.org/info/knuth-pdf/errata/errorlog.pdf (typeset from source: https://mirrors.ctan.org/systems/knuth/dist/errata/errorlog.tex https://mirrors.ctan.org/systems/knuth/dist/errata/errorlog....) The 37-page paper that precedes the error log, The Errors of TeX, has been reprinted (as always, with minor corrections) as Chapter 10 of the book of collected papers titled Literate Programming https://cs.stanford.edu/~knuth/lp.html https://cs.stanford.edu/~knuth/lp.html — Knuth has not published its .tex source, though it's not impossible to find…

WillAdams 2y ago

While not an article, a more recent listing (current as of 15 January 2021) is: https://ctan.math.washington.edu/tex-archive/info/knuth-pdf/errata/errorlog.pdf https://ctan.math.washington.edu/tex-archive/info/knuth-pdf/... and he also keeps track of errors in his books: https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/books.html https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/books.html and issues certificates for the Bank of the Island of San Seriffe for finding them (used to be physical checks --- I got one for an error and a minor point of improvement in his book on _Digital Typography_).