david said:
It gives me a better printout than anything else I've seen can.
the .pdf that my viewer-program creates is virtually a _screen-dump_ of its display in normal operation. (it's more work than a screen-dump, because a screen-dump doesn't allow the text to be _searchable_, but it's a re-creation of the screen.) so if/when i get the .pdf looking pretty, it will be because the on-screen display looked pretty to begin with.
And I don't think that "allow[ing] the end user to have the maximum amount of input as to the which rendering decisions are made" is a good idea. Options take time to code, most people don't care about widows and orphans, and a page full of mysterious options (and I suspect widows and orphans fall into that classification for many users) is a way to drive away many users.
i understand your point, and agree with it to some extent. but i probably disagree with it more than i agree with it... first, people _do_ care about widows and orphans. even if they don't know what they are. what they _do_ know is that "this page looks a little clunky". i mean, face it, even the typographically-challenged notice when a whole page has one single line of type. they won't call it "an orphan". but they will laugh... and while it is true that "options take time to code" (by which i take it you mean "selecting options takes time for the user to do", and not to "program" per se), the lesson of that observation is having the right defaults. and strict control of widows/orphans _is_ the right default. do a good job of setting up your defaults all the way around, and naive users won't ever have to go to the options screen. but it's still there for sophisticated users who _do_ want. it... perhaps more ideally, a great program will _teach_ its users about its options, in a manner that is gentle and informative. it is not a good program that wants to keep its users stupid... throwing a lot of options at a user who doesn't understand them is obviously not a good way to proceed. but taking away options is not the best alternative, especially not in the world of e-books, where the availability of those options is one of the chief appeals. -bowerbird