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Re: getting out of LaTeX

Subject: Re: getting out of LaTeX
From: Lee Sau Dan
Date: Thu, 31 Aug 2006 07:53:16 +0800
Newsgroups: sci.lang
>>>>> "des" == des small <vonbladet@xxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

    des> Lee Sau Dan <danlee@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:
    >> >>>>> "des" == des small <vonbladet@xxxxxxxxxxx> writes:
    >> 
    des> Is there a source control system that handles esoteric things
    des> like not having the 'line' as a unit in its diff algorithm?
    >>  Emac's ediff can refine that to character level diff.

    des> What is "character level diff"?  What I want is that the diff
    des> algorithm ignores semantically irrelevant whitespace in LaTeX
    des> sources.

Ediff can  take a  region of  text (derived from  the output  of plain
diff) and do the diff on that region, not using line as a unit.

BTW, did you know that "diff -B" ignores whitespaces?



    >> Why use closed-source, UNDOCUMENTED, proprietary formats?

    des> I mostly don't.

That question is addressed to everyone, not just you specifically.



    >> XML files are structure as trees, and tree-diffing is not a
    >> well defined problem.  i.e. When you say "give me a diff of
    >> these 2 trees", there is no single answer.  For text, we can
    >> define the "optimal" answer to be the one with minimal editing
    >> distance.  And text 'diff' tools are based on this.  The
    >> optimal answer gives results that we want.  However, for
    >> tree-diff's, it is difficult even to define what is "optimal".
    >> What should be "optimal" varies from application to
    >> application.

    des> So what you're saying is I'd still be screwed with ODF for
    des> the time being; double whoop.

I mean  you're asking for  something (XML diff)  to be done,  but that
something is  not described (please  define what is an  "optimal" tree
diff) clear enough for computers to handle in a way that would satisfy
you.  Remember, computers are very stupid and can't read your mind.



-- 
Lee Sau Dan                     +Z05biGVm-                          +AH4-{@nJX6X+AH4-}

E-mail: danlee@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Home page: http://www.informatik.uni-freiburg.de/+AH4-danlee

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