🚀 go-pugleaf

cameron smith (comp.text.tex, 24 july 92) wonders (and has for a long
time) why the reference point for dvi files is 1in down and 1in from
the left edge of the paper.

i just happen to have an archive of the complete discussion that took
place over texhax during the spring of 1984, starting on (this is
true!) april 1.  the file amounts to something over 400 lines.

highlights of the discussion included suggestions that output be
automatically centered on a page, that the zero-point be the physical
upper left corner of the paper (but this is bad if one sending output
to a typesetter and needs to include crop marks generated with tex),
various problems of machine dependency including unwritable areas,
whether there is a difference if one is using latex, and some other
considerations.  the attached two messages are what i consider the
authoritative answer to the question.  the 1in,1in location is
somewhat arbitrary, but as has already been pointed out, a single
agreed-on value permits all users to be able to depend on what will
come out of their printers, even if they move around.

if any students of historical tex trivia are interested in the full
discussion, i shall ask george greenwade if he will consider putting
it into the shsu archive.
						-- bb
			--------------------

>Date: 21 Jul 84  1303 PDT
>From: David Fuchs <DRF@SU-AI.ARPA>
>Subject: cutting corners

The (0,0) DVI-coordinate is one inch from the top of the paper and one
inch from the left.  All 8.5x11 printers should follow this convention for
all TeX output.  Likewise for any other size page printers.  This has
nothing to do with LaTeX vs. non-LaTeX; it is a general "TeX Standard".
Many smart DVI-reading programs allow the user to alter the default
margins, but the TeX standard default is (1inch,1inch).  Absolutely,
positively.  If a user is not happy with where their output appears on the
page, they may simply insert an \hoffset or \voffset command at the
beginning of their job, thus there is no need for a \special.  Automatic
centering would result in \hoffset and \voffset not doing what one would
expect, among other problems.  There is no reason to use a more complex
system when the simple (1inch,1inch) one coves just as many bases.

The Great and Powerful Oz has spoken.

	-david

p.s. For real phototypesetters, other considerations are more important
than consistency between output devices.  In order to use less-expensive
narrower paper, it may be reasonable to do away entirely with any extra
margins.  Because the typesetter output is only an intermediate stage in
the production of a book, as long as an entire book is self-consistent it
matters little how the margins are set.  Noting that most of the books
that go through our typesetter are done with more than one DVI file (due
to last-minute corrections, if nothing else), it seems that for the sake
of the photographer's sanity it's still a good idea to avoid automatic
centering.
  -------
>Date: Sun 22 Jul 84 10:46:04-PDT
>From: David Fuchs <DRF@SU-SCORE.ARPA>
>Subject: of marginal importance

p.p.s.s.  If for no other reason, one inch margins are clearly the
standard considering the following quotations from The TeXbook:

``If you run TeX without modifying the plain TeX format, you get
  pages...8 1/2 inches wide and 11 inches tall, including 1-inch
  margins at all four sides.''

``Plain TeX format says `\hsize=6.5in', in order to obtain 8.5-inch
  pages with 1-inch margins.''

``If you want your output to be positioned differently when it is
  ultimately printed, you can offset it by giving nonzero values to
  \hoffset and \voffset. For example,
        	\hoffset=.5in   \voffset=1.5in
  will move the output half an inch to the right of its normal position,
  and 1.5 inches down.''