In changing iMemoryBook to MemoryPress, we feel that it is extremely important for those who use MemoryPress to understand the importance of typesetting your book with a real typesetting system.

“Typesetting involves the presentation of textual material in graphic form on paper or some other medium. Before the advent of desktop publishing, typesetting of printed material was produced in print shops by compositors working by hand, and later with machines.” - Wikipedia

World Class Typesetting
Three powerful typesetting systems are responsible for almost every modern book, magazine, catalog, and newspaper you have ever seen or read: TeX, Quark Xpress ($749.00 software package), and Adobe InDesign ($699.00 software package). Hiring a professional typesetter to run these systems for you would only set you back $1,000 to $2,000 per book. MemoryPress delivers the power of TeX to your family library, making it simple for you to create a book that even Gutenberg could be proud of.

History of TeX
The following brief history of TeX will educate you a little in the importance of typesetting. You will better understand why MemoryPress is the solution to building your family library, not like simple word processors and cheap book making systems.

In 1969, Professor Donald Knuth, at Stanford University, published his first book. Knuth’s publisher produced a beautifully typeset book using the classical process, called mono-type, a century old technology for laying out the text in books. Years later, in 1977, he completed the manuscript for a new volume of his book. This time Knuth decided to try out the new computerized typesetting systems. He received the galley proofs–previews of what his book would look like–and compared them to the classical book he had previously published. The galley proofs were awful. After a futile search for a computerized typesetting solution, Knuth decided to take a year off his work to create the needed solution. He got hooked and he started on a 12 year journey creating TeX, one of the world’s most stable and advanced typesetting systems. Consider the differences in the following examples from TeX and Microsoft Word.

Example 1 - Common Ligatures

Example 2 - Real Small Caps

Example 3 - Real World Example

TeX (professionally typeset) Microsoft Word (many errors)

When typesetting just one small example of words in Alice in Wonderland, note three major differences between professional typesetting, powered by TeX, and Microsoft Word. First, look carefully how TeX uses contentual intelligence to determine that a ligature is needed to combine the “f” and “i” in the word “finishing.” Second, TeX avoids placing “So” on its own line, making the sentence easier to read. Finally, TeX also produces a more balanced text block by extending the last sentence out on the final line, instead of leaving “been” hanging. Professional books are built upon this attention to balance and detail.If MS Word makes this many mistakes in a simple 86 word excerpt of Alice and Wonderland, how many mistakes are there going to be in a whole book?

Because of these and many other advanced typesetting features, TeX is used as a standard for publishing the most demanding mathematical textbooks at most of the world’s academic presses (including books published by Addison-Wesley, Cambridge University Press, and Oxford University Press). Since TeX release, other world class standards like Adobe InDesign ($699.00) have adopted TeX state of the art algorithms for creating beautifully typeset books. TeX isn’t a dinky word processor; it typesets books on a professional grade.

Although TeX has typeset millions of professional books over the years, the TeX program was too complex for most people* until now. TeX is the typesetting engine behind MemoryPress and will produce a finer typeset result than other book making systems. Why would you trust your family history with anything less than world class typesetting? MemoryPress makes you an expert typesetter without making you learn TeX. Even better, you don’t have to purchase and learn $699 to $749.00 software applications.

Are you familiar with TeX? We would love to hear your comments. Tell us what you think of this post.
* This article refers to LaTeX, a macro programming language that simplifies typesetting in TeX (at least for a programmer). Most people even think LaTeX is very difficult to learn.

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