From: Peter Simons (simons_at_[hidden])
Date: 2002-10-31 04:41:47
Anthony Williams writes:
> IOW, both DocBook and (La)TeX can be used to write documents that
> can be transformed into whatever output you require, but the
> techniques are different.
The difference is that powerful SGML or XML parsers are readily
available and work reliably, so you can trivially write any kind of
post-processor to generate fancy cross-references, check for errors,
inconsistencies in the _content_, and so on ... While you _can_ do all
these things in LaTeX as well, it is a completely different level of
complexity to actually do it.
I am sure that those knowledgeable in low-level TeX can achieve
amazing things within LaTeX itself, but trying to write a tool in,
say, C++ that understands LaTeX is nothing I'd want to do.
-peter