Whenever I feel bad about yak shaving, I’m reminded of Donald Knuth.
Apparently, he was writing his masterwork “The Art of Computer Programming” and decided to take a few weeks to write a better typesetter.
Thus, TeX was born.
10 years later he returned to continue the writing of the actual book…
@leaverou that’s one heck of a side quest. Mortgages were different in 1958 😅
Jul 29, 2024, 2:25 PM@leaverou While working on TeX, he also had to write a font development software.
Thus, METAFONT was born.
@rajeesh Sounds like his yaks were shaving yaks (just like me! https://front-end.social/@leaverou/112859239717469008 )
Jul 29, 2024, 9:47 PM@leaverou ADHD Hyperfocus FTW
Jul 30, 2024, 10:10 AM@leaverou I believe that it took that long as he had a couple of detours: metafont and WEB/CWEB. But it only make your argument for yak shaving stronger 😎
Aug 5, 2024, 7:53 PM