Oh how much i would love to have good way how to generate print quality PDFs. The real problem is not hyphenation but how lines are composed. If you want even lines in type set to block then there is probably only Adobe Indesign and LaTeX anything else uses "single line composer" i dont know the algorythm but Latex and Indesign are only ones which take multiple lines into considiration. Latex is sort of Okay but the algorythm in Indesign is still highly superior. I suspect that is some Adobe secret sauce. Pity because you cant run indesign on server, you have it open and use "extendscript" their version of old ECMAScript 3 :(
Adobe's secret sauce is largely implemented in the microtype package in LaTeX world (character protrusion for optical margin alignment and font expansion for more even interword spacing and less hyphenation). Also the technology didn't originate at Adobe; Adobe purchased the technology from URW who developed the hz-program that was the real pioneer for those micro-typographic adjustments.
Microtype package is pretty great. I want latex to work for me - maybe i am missing something but it always bothered me that i have to mix content with styling. I guess it is great when you are writing something yours and you work on styling and content at the same time. Most of my uscases are unfortunately feeding some text input and spitting pdf.
Have you looked at Prince [1]? It's commercial, but highly regarded.
The coolest project I've seen with it is OMA (Rem Koolhaas' architecture firm), which uses it to print internal, very professional-looking booklets automatically generated from data, text and photos stored in Sanity [2]. (The Sanity team also built the system to make the booklets.)
I know about it but it is pretty expensive so i never gave it any thought. I am not sure if i can test it anyhow.
It is probably nobrainer if you are generating pdfs all the time but i would have to use it on multiple projects to make it financially possible. Funnily enough right now i am working on archive for architecture company. But thats like 100 pdfs.
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Oh how much i would love to have good way how to generate print quality PDFs. The real problem is not hyphenation but how lines are composed. If you want even lines in type set to block then there is probably only Adobe Indesign and LaTeX anything else uses "single line composer" i dont know the algorythm but Latex and Indesign are only ones which take multiple lines into considiration. Latex is sort of Okay but the algorythm in Indesign is still highly superior. I suspect that is some Adobe secret sauce. Pity because you cant run indesign on server, you have it open and use "extendscript" their version of old ECMAScript 3 :(
Adobe's secret sauce is largely implemented in the microtype package in LaTeX world (character protrusion for optical margin alignment and font expansion for more even interword spacing and less hyphenation). Also the technology didn't originate at Adobe; Adobe purchased the technology from URW who developed the hz-program that was the real pioneer for those micro-typographic adjustments.
Microtype package is pretty great. I want latex to work for me - maybe i am missing something but it always bothered me that i have to mix content with styling. I guess it is great when you are writing something yours and you work on styling and content at the same time. Most of my uscases are unfortunately feeding some text input and spitting pdf.
Have you looked at Prince [1]? It's commercial, but highly regarded.
The coolest project I've seen with it is OMA (Rem Koolhaas' architecture firm), which uses it to print internal, very professional-looking booklets automatically generated from data, text and photos stored in Sanity [2]. (The Sanity team also built the system to make the booklets.)
[1] https://www.princexml.com
[2] https://www.sanity.io/docs/introduction/what-the-headless
I know about it but it is pretty expensive so i never gave it any thought. I am not sure if i can test it anyhow.
It is probably nobrainer if you are generating pdfs all the time but i would have to use it on multiple projects to make it financially possible. Funnily enough right now i am working on archive for architecture company. But thats like 100 pdfs.
It's not cheap, but if you run it on a single server, you can use it for as many projects as you like.
Apparently someone made a hosted SaaS version, though, which might be affordable if you don't produce a lot of pages: https://docraptor.com/signup.
Are you sure that it is Prince powering this?
Yes. It's in the documentation.
This thesis has a good discussion of the issue. Pages 15-16 discuss Adobe’s secret sauce (though it is secret). https://www.tug.org/TUGboat/tb21-4/tb69thanh.pdf