July 13, 2025
Following Lionel's lead on reading Synergetics out loud, I have gone back to translating my digital version of Synergetics. Starting in 400.00 System, I've rebuilt the numbering system in LaTeX so they work across the different file types and can detect issues like missing or duplicated numbers. PDF remains the most accurate representation of the original, but ePub and mobi are getting better. WikiJS is still a work in progress simply due to the complications of rendering math in markdown (which is a subset of HTML).
My favorite improvement is the conversion of raster images to svgs. The scanned images begin in .tiff and are compressed to jpg or png but are prone to pixelation and messy artifacts. SVGs are vector images and are resolution independent. They are also easier to edit and manipulate. The process is automated and takes about 10 minutes to convert all the images. Here are some tests from Synergetics figures.
12-around-1
https://www.buckyverse.org/en/synergetics/content/images/400.00/image21.jpg
https://www.buckyverse.org/en/synergetics/content/images/400.00/image21.svg
Vector Equilibrium
https://www.buckyverse.org/en/synergetics/content/images/400.00/image25.jpg
https://www.buckyverse.org/en/synergetics/content/images/400.00/image25.svg
To make this process manageable, I have been breaking the work into smaller chunks. Chapter 400.00 is now broken into twelve separate files, each by section. Every figure is a separate file that includes the images and descriptions. Tables are individual files.
In between waiting for all the files to generate when testing changes, I started another experiment. This is a draft manuscript for a book to introduce me to Synergetics:
https://www.buckyverse.org/en/synergetics_a_new_hope/index
I'll keep going. Enjoy!
-=Brett