Re: Concrete definition/macro problem...

[Jeff Kingston]

(1) Macros cannot contain unmatched {, }, @Begin, or @End.         
 
(2) The problem with & is that when you want to merge an entire
    abstract with the word Abstract you are really merging
 
        Abstract
 
    with an entire sequence of paragraphs       
 
        First paragraph of abstract
        @LP
        Second paragraph of abstract
        ...
 
    To get the abstract at the start of the first paragraph, as
    desired, use                             
 
        Abstract @Insert <large object containing several paras>
 
    Better check the expert's guide and look at @FootNote, it's
    been a while since I used @Insert myself.
 
(3) "how do I tell Lout a text string is a paragraph and can be
     broken into lines? Sometimes Lout does it, and sometimes
     (most notably inside boxes) it uses horizontal scaling to make        
     the box fit into the line."
 
   This could refer to several things.  I'd be happy to take it
   further, especially given an example.

(4) "By the way, for obtaining citations like [Kin98] I currently use
     a @Filter driving a small Haskell program --- is there a way to do   
     it inside Lout?"
 
     Yes if the citation database contains Kin98 as a @Label or perhaps
     @Key.  No if it has to be generated automatically from the @Author
     and @Year fields, or if you need Kin98a, Kin98b etc. generated
     automatically based on realizing that some references would have
     the same tag if the extra letter were not appended.
 
(5) Lout generates PDF but Lout's diagram drawing stuff comes out
    blank in PDF versions, and this is unlikely to change soon.   

Jeff