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Computers & Typesetting, Volume C: The Metafont Book
- By Donald E. Knuth
- Published Jan 1, 1986 by Addison-Wesley Professional.
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About
Features
| Innovations interviews Donald Knuth |
He joined Stanford University as Professor of Computer Science in 1968, and was appointed to Stanford's first endowed chair in computer science nine years later. As a university professor he introduced a variety of new courses into the curriculum, notably Data Structures and Concrete Mathematics. In 1993 he became Professor Emeritus of The Art of Computer Programming. He has supervised the dissertations of 28 students.
Knuth began in 1962 to prepare textbooks about programming techniques, and this work evolved into a projected seven-volume series entitled The Art of Computer Programming. Volumes 1-3 first appeared in 1968, 1969, and 1973. Having revised these three in 1997, he is now working full time on the remaining volumes. Approximately one million copies have already been printed, including translations into six languages. He took ten years off from this project to work on digital typography, developing the TeX system for document preparation and the METAFONT system for alphabet design. Noteworthy by-products of those activities were the WEB and CWEB languages for structured documentation, and the accompanying methodology of Literate Programming. TeX is now used to produce most of the world's scientific literature in physics and mathematics.
His research papers have been instrumental in establishing several subareas of computer science and software engineering: LR(k) parsing; attribute grammars; the Knuth-Bendix algorithm for axiomatic reasoning; empirical studies of user programs and profiles; analysis of algorithms. In general, his works have been directed towards the search for a proper balance between theory and practice.
Professor Knuth received the ACM Turing Award in 1974 and became a Fellow of the British Computer Society in 1980, an Honorary Member of the IEEE in 1982. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and a foreign associate of l'Academie des Sciences (Paris) and Det Norske Videnskaps-Akademi (Oslo). He holds five patents and has published approximately 160 papers in addition to his 19 books. He received the Medal of Science from President Carter in 1979, the American Mathematical Society's Steele Prize for expository writing in 1986, the New York Academy of Sciences Award in 1987, the J.D. Warnier Prize for software methodology in 1989, the Adelsköld Medal from the Swedish Academy of Sciences in 1994, the Harvey Prize from the Technion in 1995, and the Kyoto Prize for advanced technology in 1996. He was a charter recipient of the IEEE Computer Pioneer Award in 1982, after having received the IEEE Computer Society's W. Wallace McDowell Award in 1980; he received the IEEE's John von Neumann Medal in 1995. He holds honorary doctorates from Oxford University, the University of Paris, St. Petersburg University, and more than a dozen colleges and universities in America.
Professor Knuth lives on the Stanford campus with his wife, Jill. They have two children, John and Jennifer. Music is his main avocation.
Description
- Copyright 1986
- Dimensions: 7-3/8" x 9-1/4"
- Pages: 384
- Edition: 1st
- Book
- ISBN-10: 0-201-13445-4
- ISBN-13: 978-0-201-13445-2
A Complete User's Guide to Typeface Design with METAFONT
Now, 35 years after the first edition, the leading worldwide experts on these systems have spent several months inspecting every page thoroughly. We now believe that every "i" has been properly dotted, every "t" has been properly crossed, and every bug has been properly exterminated.
METAFONT, created by author Donald E. Knuth, is a computer language that allows you to produce professional quality typefaces using mathematical type design. The METAFONTbook, a users guide and reference manual, enables readers with only minimal computer science or word processing experience to master the basic as well as the more advanced areas of METAFONT programming.
Readers will learn how to write a program for each letter or symbol of a typeface. Using METAFONT, it is possible to customize a type design that already exists, or even to create an entire alphabet from scratch. It is particularly easy to create logos or special symbols. Advanced users will enjoy the freedom and artistry that METAFONT allows in creating original typefaces.
HIGHLIGHTS
- Introduces concepts informally early in the text; in later chapters, these concepts are filled in with more detailed explanations.
- Program exercises are found throughout the text with answers in an appendix.
- Exercises and concepts of greater difficulty are marked with margin symbols. In this way, both beginning and experienced users of METAFONT can benefit.
- The book is a companion text to Knuth's The TeXbook, since TeX can be used to typeset with fonts created using METAFONT.
Knuth's familiar wit, and illustrations specially drawn by Duane Bibby, add a light touch to an unusually readable software manual.
The METAFONTbook is the third in a five-volume series on Computers and Typesetting, all authored by Knuth. The METAFONTbook is also available in softcover.