new texinfo version

[Werner LEMBERG]

Folks,


given that lilypond is very demanding w.r.t. texinfo it might be a
good idea to test the prelease of the upcoming 4.14 version.

The greatest drawback is, AFAIK, that texi2html is *much* slower, so
someone with a fast machine should try it...


    Werner


======================================================================


Finally, the first pretest for the next Texinfo release is available:

  ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/texinfo/texinfo-4.13.90.tar.xz
 http://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/texinfo/texinfo-4.13.90.tar.xz

NEWS below.  Although this is a pretest, we do not plan to implement
more language features before the next official release, unless small
and useful things come up in testing.  (The TODO list remains long!)
We do plan to review the main manual before the official release, but
all the new features are already documented there, as far as we know.

Our intent is for this new release to be compatible with past versions,
at least for reasonably well-formed manuals, despite having a completely
new implementation of makeinfo (written in Perl).  However, almost
surely compatibility issues will arise with documents we did not test.
Please report them so we can discuss.

We've also made efforts to keep this new release as portable as before,
beyond the basic new requirement of Perl ("new" modules or features are
not needed).  But again, almost surely there will be portability
problems we haven't encountered, so please report those too.

Please send any feedback here, to bug-texinfo.

Thanks,
Karl & Patrice

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

* Language:
  . Texinfo commands are supported in node names.
  . #line directives are recognized.
  . new commands @inlinefmt and @inlineraw for brace-delimited conditionals.
  . new conditionals @ifcommanddefined and @ifcommandnotdefined to test
    if a Texinfo command is available.
  . new command @part for a group of chapters.
  . new environments @raggedright, @smallquotation,
      @indentedblock, and @smallindentedblock.
  . new commands @codequoteundirected and @codequotebacktick,
      for a better interface than the @set variables; now respected by @kbd.
  . new command @xrefautomaticsectiontitle to allow using section titles
      in cross references by default, instead of node names.
  . new commands for Texinfo special characters:
    @atchar{} @lbracechar{} @rbracechar{} @backslashchar{} @hashchar{}.
  . new commands @deftypefnnewline to print return types on their own lines.
  . new command @headitemfont for the sake of template rows.
  . new command @urefbreakstyle to control breaking of @url/@uref in TeX.
  . new diacritic command @ogonek.
  . new commands for Icelandic letters eth and thorn: @DH{} @dh{} @TH{} @th{}.
  . new command @errormsg to report an error.
  . five-argument xrefs can refer to a whole manual, by omitting the
      section name and either omitting the node name or using "Top".
  . DEL (0x7f = 0177 = 127) is a true comment character (catcode 14 in TeX).

* texi2any is the new generic converter for Texinfo that can produce all
  supported output formats, both those from texi2dvi (PDF/DVI) and from
  makeinfo (Info/HTML/etc.).  texi2any and makeinfo are now different
  names for the same program; there are no differences in behavior based
  on the program name.

  The new implementation is in Perl (based on the texi2html program, but
  with a vast array of subsequent changes).  It both replaces and is
  intended to be (for all practical purposes) upward-compatible with the
  C makeinfo.  It has many new features not in the C makeinfo.  For
  example, cross-manual references are now fully supported, and
  extensive customization of the HTML output is possible.  See the
  `Generic Translator texi2any' chapter in the manual (among other places)
  for more about this reimplementation.
  
  The new program is, unfortunately, noticeably slower at present than
  the C program was.  We hope all the many improvements make the new
  version worthwhile for users nevertheless.

* texinfo.tex:
  . urls (given to @uref and @url) are broken by default at special
    characters; behavior controllable with @urefbreakstyle.
  . support some per-language hyphenation, when the underlying TeX
    engine does (for instance, etex/pdfetex from TeX Live 2008 or
    later).  Words with accented letters are still not handled properly.
  . @title, text will be broken if needed, and @* can be used to override.
  . new Icelandic translation: txi-is.tex.
  . new Hungarian translation: txi-hu.tex.
  . official updates between full package releases available at
    http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/texinfo/texinfo.tex.

* texi2dvi:
  . new option --max-iterations.
  . official updates between full package releases available at
    http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/texinfo/texi2dvi.
  
* info:
  . INFOPATH is determined from PATH by default, or if an element "PATH"
    is specified.
  . New command Info-virtual-index, bound to I by default, following Emacs.
  . Info keywords not included in searches.
  . There is a lower limit on the length of search patterns.  The default
    value is 1.  It can be changed by setting the variable min-search-length,
    either by `M-x set-variable', or using infokey.
  . xz compression supported.

* install-info:
  . xz compression supported.

* Documentation:
  . new appendix with a technical description of the Info file format.
  . extensive information on the customizations of the HTML output that
    are now possible.

* Distribution:
  . new file htmlxref.cnf is installed to support cross-manual
    references; official updates between full package releases available at
    http://ftpmirror.gnu.org/texinfo/htmlxref.cnf.
  . language support for no removed/renamed to nb, per Norwegian translators.
  . new translations: id it.
  . documentation license now GFDLv1.3 or later.