UNIX Time-Sharing System: Document Preparation

Document Preparation By B. W. KERNIGHAN, M. E. LESK, and J. F. OSSANNA, Jr. (Manuscript received January 6, 1978) The UNIX* operating system provides programs for sophisticated document preparation within the framework of a general-purpose operating system. The document preparation software includes a text editor, programmable text formatters, macro-definition packages for a variety of page layout styles, special processors for mathematical expressions and for tabular material, and numerous supporting programs, such as a spelling-mistake detector. In practice, this collection of facilities has proven to be easy to learn and use, even by secretaries, typists, and other nonspecialists. Experiments have shown that preparation of complicated documents is about twice as fast as on other systems. There are many benefits to using a general-purpose operating system instead of specialized stand-alone terminals or a system dedicated'to "word processing. " On the UNIX system, these include an excellent software development facility and the ability to share computing and data resources among a community of users. I. INTRODUCTION We use the term document preparation to mean the creation, modification, and display of textual material, such as manuals, reports, papers, and books. " D o c u m e n t preparation" seems preferable to "text processing" (which is not particularly precise), or * UNIX is a trademark of Bell Laboratories. 2115 "word processing" (which has acquired connotations of stand-alone specialized terminals).