Ubuntu Manpage: patgen - generate patterns for TeX hyphenation

Provided by: texlive-binaries_2023.20230311.66589-6ubuntu0.1_amd64

NAME

       patgen - generate patterns for TeX hyphenation

SYNOPSIS

       patgen dictionary_file pattern_file patout_file translate_file

DESCRIPTION

This manual page is not meant to be exhaustive. See also the Info file or manual Web2C: A
TeX implementation available as part of the TeX Live distribution or at
http://tug.org/web2c.

The patgen program reads the dictionary_file containing a list of hyphenated words and the
pattern_file containing previously-generated patterns (if any) for a particular language
(not a complete TeX source file; see below), and produces the patout_file with
(previously- plus newly-generated) hyphenation patterns for that language. The
translate_file defines language specific values for the parameters left_hyphen_min and
right_hyphen_min used by TeX's hyphenation algorithm and the external representation of
the lower and upper case version(s) of all `letters' of that language. Further details of
the pattern generation process such as hyphenation levels and pattern lengths are
requested interactively from the user's terminal. Optionally patgen creates a new
dictionary file pattmp.n showing the good and bad hyphens found by the generated patterns,
where n is the highest hyphenation level.

The patterns generated by patgen can be read by initex for use in hyphenating words. For a
real-life example of patgen's output, see $TEXMFMAIN/tex/generic/hyphen/hyphen.tex, which
contains the patterns TeX uses for English by default. At some sites, patterns for (many)
other languages may be available, and the local tex programs may have them preloaded.

All filenames must be complete; no adding of default extensions or path searching is done.

FILE FORMATS

Letters
When initex digests hyphenation patterns, TeX first expands macros and the result must
entirely consist of digits (hyphenation levels), dots (`.', edge of a word), and
letters. In pattern files for non-English languages letters are often represented by
macros or other expandable constructs. For the purpose of patgen these are just
character sequences, subject to the condition that no such sequence is a prefix of
another one.

Dictionary file
A dictionary file contains a weighted list of hyphenated words, one word per line
starting in column 1. A digit in column 1 indicates a global word weight (initially
=1) applicable to all following words up to the next global word weight. A digit at
some intercharacter position indicates a weight for that position only.

The hyphens in a word are indicated by `-', `*', or `.' (or their replacements as
defined in the translate file) for hyphens yet to be found, `good' hyphens (correctly
found by the patterns), and `bad' hyphens (erroneously found by the patterns)
respectively; when reading a dictionary file `*' is treated like `-' and `.' is
ignored.

Pattern file
A pattern file contains only patterns in the format above, e.g., from a previous run
of patgen. It may not contain any TeX comments or control sequences. For instance,
this is not a valid pattern file:

% this is a pattern file read by TeX.
\patterns{%
...
}
It can only contain the actual patterns, i.e., the `...'.

Translate file
A translate file starts with a line containing the values of left_hyphen_min in
columns 1-2, right_hyphen_min in columns 3-4, and either a blank or the replacement
for one of the "hyphen" characters `-', `*', and `.' in columns 5, 6, and 7. (Input
lines are padded with blanks as for many TeX related programs.)

Each following line defines one `letter': an arbitrary delimiter character in column
1, followed by one or more external representations of that character (first the
`lower' case one used for output), each one terminated by the delimiter and the whole
sequence terminated by another delimiter.

If the translate file is empty, the values left_hyphen_min=2, right_hyphen_min=3, and
the 26 lower case letters a...z with their upper case representations A...Z are
assumed.

Terminal input
After reading the translate_file and any previously-generated patterns from
pattern_file, patgen requests input from the user's terminal.

First the integer values of hyph_start and hyph_finish, the lowest and highest
hyphenation level for which patterns are to be generated. The value of hyph_start
should be larger than any hyphenation level already present in pattern_file.

Then, for each hyphenation level, the integer values of pat_start and pat_finish, the
smallest and largest pattern length to be analyzed, as well as good weight, bad
weight, and threshold, the weights for good and bad hyphens and a weight threshold for
useful patterns.

Finally the decision (`y' or `Y' vs. anything else) whether or not to produce a
hyphenated word list.

FILES

       $TEXMFMAIN/tex/generic/hyphen/hyphen.tex
           The original hyphenation patterns for English, by Donald Knuth and Frank Liang.

       http://www.ctan.org/pkg/ushyph
           Additional hyphenation patterns for English, extended by Gerard Kuiken.

       http://www.ctan.org/pkg/hyph-utf8
           Collected hyphenation patterns for many languages in many formats.

       http://www.ctan.org/tex-archive/language/
           General CTAN directory for patterns and support for many other languages.

AUTHORS