Tex2RTF FAQ

Is Tex2RTF free?

Yes, there are no restrictions, no acknowledgements necessary, etc. Obviously if you're using Tex2RTF source in your application, an ackowledgement of the author would be nice.

Is Tex2RTF supported?

Yes and no. I try to fix major bugs, but I can't guarantee anything since I have lots of other (and paid) work to do. See the next item.

What do I do if I find a bug or missing feature?

I'll be happy to hear about it, and if it's an easy fix, I'll probably do it - otherwise it will have to go on the ToDo list for an arbitrary amount of time. I'm happy to accept consultancy work based on Tex2RTF, especially if the resulting enhancements can be released into the public domain.

Why is it called Tex2RTF when it only handles a subset of LaTeX?

It just happened to fit the MS DOS 8.3 filename convention. Sorry about that :-)

Does Tex2RTF handle equations?

Sorry, no. This would be complex, and there aren't many target formats that handle them well. Word RTF equations would need some manual adjustment, and not many browsers handle the HTML math tags. Also, I didn't implement them because I didn't need them for my own purposes. The Tex2RTF parser would really need rewriting in e.g. LEX/YACC before such an addition would be possible.

Do you know of any LaTeX to RTF or HTML translator that handles equations?

There's the Perl-based latextohtml which generates bitmaps for complex typesetting such as equations. This runs on Unix only. I don't know of any other translators that handle equations.

Why doesn't Tex2RTF handle space/arbitrary TeX/etc. well?

The parser part of Tex2RTF is not well written - it's fragile and needs rewriting (see above). However, it caters for most of my needs, which is why I haven't been able to justify rewriting it.

Is LaTeX2e supported?

Not really, though there are a few feeble attempts to recognise some constructs. I just haven't needed it... ordinary LaTeX doesn't seem broken enough to start messing around with a new version. It's bad enough having new Microsoft APIs to worry about, without LaTeX changing under one's feet!

Is a binary available on my platform?

I can supply binaries for those platforms I have access to, i.e. Windows 3.1, Windows 95/NT and Linux (XView, Motif and command-line). For other platforms, you need to compile the source yourself, which should be reasonably easy on Unix and Windows platforms.

How easy would it be to add another output format?

Quite easy. Tex2RTF separates the parsing and output phases, so just use an existing file as a template (e.g. htmlutil.cpp, rtfutils.cpp) and have a go.