Subsections

- 1st LATEX2HTML Workshop
  Darmstadt, 15 February 1997
- TUG'97 -- Workshop on LATEX2HTML
  University of San Francisco, 28 July 1997
- TEXNortheast TUG Conference, TEX/LATEX Now
  March 22-24, 1998, New York City
- Euro-TEX'98, 10th European TEX Conference
  St. Malo, France -- 29-31 March, 1998

#
Developments: late 1996 to mid 1997

During the latter part of 1996 there was much work on improving the capabilities of LATEX2`HTML`. Some of this was due to the World Wide Web Consortium's proposals for `HTML` 3.2, becoming a formal recommendation in November 1996, and their subsequent acceptance in January 1997. Existing LATEX markup for effects such as centering, left- or right-justification of paragraphs, flow of text around images, table-layout with formal captions, etc. could now be given a safe translation into `HTML` 3.2, compliant with a standard that would guarantee that browsers would be available to view such effects.

At the same time developers were exploring ways to enhance the overall performance of LATEX2`HTML`. As a result the current V97.1 release has significant improvements in the following areas:

image-generation
  is much faster, requires less memory and inline images are aligned more accurately;
image quality
  is greatly improved by the use of anti-aliasing effects for on-screen clarity, in particular with mathematics, text and line-drawings;
memory-requirements
  are much reduced, particularly with image-generation;
mathematics
  can now be handled using a separate parsing procedure; images of sub-parts of expressions can be created, rather than using a single image for the whole formula;
macro definitions
  having a more complicated structure than previously allowed, can now be successfully expanded;
counters
  and numbering are no longer entirely dependent on the `.aux` file generated by LATEX;
decisions
  about which environments to include or exclude can now be made;
HTML effects
  for which there is no direct LATEX counterpart can be requested in a variety of new ways;
HTML code
  produced by the translator is much neater and more easily readable, containing more comments and fewer redundant breaks and `<P>` tags.
error-detection
  of simple LATEX errors, such as missing or unmatched braces, is now performed -- a warning message shows a line or two of the source code where the error has apparently occurred;

For these developments, thanks goes especially to:

Jens Lippmann
  for creating and maintaining the CVS repository at `http://www.latex2html.org/user/`. This has made it much easier for the contributions from different developers to be collected and maintained as a ``development version'' which is kept up-to-date and available at all times. Together with Marek Rouchal he produced an extensive rewrite of the `texexpand` utility.

Ross Moore
  for extensive work on almost all aspects of the LATEX2`HTML` source and documentation, combining code for LATEX, Perl, `HTML` and other utilities. Most of the coding for the new features based on `HTML` 3.2, many of the new packages, faster image-generation and the improved support for mathematics and other environments, is his work.

Marek Rouchal
  for extending the former `pstogif` utility, transforming it into `pstoimg` which now allows for alternative image formats, such as `PNG`. Also he produced the neat `configure-pstoimg` script, which eases LATEX2`HTML` installation, and a rewrite of `texexpand`.

Marcus Hennecke
  who has always been there, up-to-date with developments in `HTML` and related matters concerning Web publishing, and tackling the issues involved with portability of LATEX2`HTML` to Unix systems on various platforms.

  Furthermore Marcus has produced LATEX2`HTML`-NG, a version of LATEX2`HTML` which handles expansion of macros in a more ``TEX-like'' fashion. This should lead to further improvements in speed and efficiency, while allowing complicated macro definitions to work as would be expected from their expansions under LATEX. (This requires Perl 5, using some programming features not available with Perl 4.)

Fabrice Popineau
  has produced an adaptation for the Windows NT platform, of LATEX2`HTML` V97.1.

Uli Wortmann
  showed how to configure Ghostscript to produce anti-aliasing effects within images.

Axel Ramge
  for various suggestions and examples of enhancements, and the code to avoid a problem with Ghostscript.

Thanks also to all those who have made bug-reports, supplied fixes or offered suggestions as to features that might allow LATEX2`HTML` to be used more efficiently in particular circumstances. Most of these have been incorporated into this new version V97.1, though perhaps not in the form originally envisaged. Such feedback has contributed enormously to helping make LATEX2`HTML` the easy to use, versatile program that it has now become.

Keep the ideas coming!

## 1st LATEX2HTML Workshop
Darmstadt, 15 February 1997

Thanks again to Jens Lippmann and members of the LiPS Design Team for organising this meeting; also to the Fachbereich Informatik at Darmstadt for use of their facilities.

This was an opportunity for many of the current LATEX2`HTML` developers to actually meet for the first time; rather than communication by exchange of electronic mail messages.

- Nikos Drakos talked about the early development of LATEX2`HTML`, while...
- ... Ross Moore, Jens Lippmann and Marek Rouchal described recent improvements.
- Michel Goossens presented a list of difficulties encountered with earlier versions of LATEX2`HTML`, and aspects requiring improvement. Almost all of these now have been addressed in the V97.1 release, so far as is possible within the bounds inherent in the `HTML` 3.2 standard.
- Kristoffer Rose showed how it is possible to create `GIF89` animations from pictures generated by TEX or LATEX, using the Xy-pic graphics package and extensions, developed by himself and Ross Moore.

Also present were representatives from the DANTE e.V. Praesidium and members of the development team.
In all it was a very pleasant and constructive meeting.

## TUG'97 -- Workshop on LATEX2HTML
University of San Francisco, 28 July 1997

On the Sunday afternoon (2.00pm-5.00pm) immediately prior to the TUG meeting, there will be a workshop on LATEX2`HTML`, conducted by Ross Moore 1.

  Admission: $50, includes a printed copy of the latest LATEX2`HTML` manual.

## TEXNortheast TUG Conference, TEX/LATEX Now
March 22-24, 1998, New York City

Includes a workshop/presentation by Ross Moore 2.

## Euro-TEX'98, 10th European TEX Conference
St. Malo, France -- 29-31 March, 1998

Several of the LATEX2`HTML` developers will be present. All European (and other) LATEX2`HTML` users are encouraged to attend.