[texhax] D. Knuth and Metapost

[Hartmut Henkel]

On Fri, 22 Aug 2003, Rodolfo Medina wrote:

> Could it be possible to create such macros and facilities (like
> Metapost's `btex' and `etex', that insert formulas inside pictures,
> and others) with Metafont?

Sure, with some effort, but what for? Metafont emits pixels (raster
graphics), but Metapost emits vectors for everything: characters,
lines... Therefore Metapost output is nicely scalable and independent
from the printing system. E. g. if you would create a figure with a
modified Metafont, zooming into it soon would show the pixelish origin.
It's really good to have a document described by vectors as far as
possible. And there is no point using mf instead of mp, as the language
is (almost) the same, e. g. you can use the mfbook to learn mp.

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Hartmut Henkel, Oftersheim, Germany
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