Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus

Side-by-side-by-side Edition master text files

If you are looking for the finished product, please visit the project page for the Side-by-Side-by-Side Edition of Wittgenstein's Tractatus.

This repository is for the master upstream text source files and processing scripts code.

If you are using UNIX-like operating system (GNU/Linux, MacOS, Cygwin or Windows subsystem for Linux), you can download/clone this repo with the command:

$ git clone https://bitbucket.org/frabjous/tractatus/tractatus.git

The important files in this repository are described below.

LaTeX/PDF related files

tlp_latex.json

This is JSON file which represents the TLP as an object in which each "proposition number" is mapped to a sub-object with three properties, "German", "Ogden" and "PearsMcGuinness", each of which is an array containing the text, using LaTeX mark-up, of the successive paragraphs of that proposition/section number, in German, or in one of the two translations. E.g.:

    ...
    "7": {
        "German": [
            "Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen."
        ],
        "Ogden": [
            "Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent."
        ],
        "PearsMcGuinness": [
            "What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence."
        ]
    }
    ...

The paragraphs of the preface come first and are given designations such a "P1" for paragraph one of the preface, matching the conventions in the index.

Note that the values use custom LaTeX commands defined in the file tlp_latex_custom_commands.tex, and so this file, or a replacement for it, must be included one way or another in order for the LaTeX code to be used. The file also contains unescaped UTF-8 encoded Unicode characters such as ß, ä, —, etc, and so it should be edited only with UTF-8/Unicode compliant editors, and the LaTeX inputenc package with the utf8 option should always be loaded.

This is the "master" text file, and future alterations to the text should be made to this file to propagate to other versions.

create_tlp_latex_version.php

This is a PHP script which uses the JSON file mentioned above and writes a complete regular LaTeX file to stdout. The output can be redirected to a file as such:

$ php create_tlp_latex_version.php > tlp.tex

Or it can be piped directly to pdflatex or similar to create a PDF file:

$ php create_tlp_latex_version.php | pdflatex -jobname tlp

This script can optionally take a single argument. This argument should be the name of a .json file which specifies custom settings for the output document. For example, to create the ebook version:

$ php create_tlp_latex_version.php ebook_latex_settings.json | pdflatex -jobname tlp-ebook

(If no option is given, it uses default_latex_settings.json.)

This and the other PHP scripts were written for PHP 7.2+; I do not know whether or not they are compatible with earlier PHP versions.

default_latex_settings.json, ebook_latex_settings.json, hierarchy_version_settings.json

These are JSON settings files that are used to create the PDF versions hosted on the project's main web page. See one of the files for the precise format. Here are the options.

1. passes: Array. Each element of the array represents a part of the text which is to be typeset in one pass-through. They each have four sub-options:

   a. minDepth: Integer. The minimum number of digits after the decimal place a given proposition/remark must have to be included in the pass. The usual value here would be 0, unless you only want to include remarks, but not what they are remarks about.

   b. maxDepth: Integer. Like minDepth, but the maximum number of digits. Possible values here are 0 through 5.

   c. startProposition: String. Where in the text to start the pass; the usual value is "1". Note that this value is a string, not a float, and should be in quotation marks in the JSON.

   d. endProposition: String. Where in the text to finish the pass; the usual value is "7". Also a string.

2. useDepthMarkers: Boolean. If true, horizontal lines will be printed between passes showing what depth range is included in the pass to follow.

3. includeCoverPage: Boolean. Whether or not to include a cover page in the resulting PDF.

4. includeDedicationPage: Boolean. Whether or not to include the dedication page in the resulting PDF.

5. includeRussellsIntro: Boolean. Whether or not to include Russell's Introduction.

6. columnsForRussellsIntro: Integer. Number of columns to typeset Russell's Introduction.

7. includePreface: Boolean. Whether or not to include Wittgenstein's preface.

8. includeGerman, includeOgden, includePearsMcGuinness: Booleans. Set to false to exclude the German, or one or both translation(s).

9. includeIndex: Boolean. Whether or not to include the index from the Pears/McGuinness translation. Note that if the version has multiple passes, the Index will hyperlink only to the last pass.

10. columnsForIndex: Integer. Number of columns for typsetting the index.

11. includeLicenseInfo: Boolean. Whether or not to include a short statement of the licenses of the text, the typesetting, and a link to the project page.

12. useBookCoverImage: Boolean. If true, and a cover page is used, creates a graphical cover as the first page of the PDF.

13. multicolumnLayout: Boolean. If true, places the translations side-by-side(-by-side) on the same page; if false, typesets them on their own pages and creates hyperlinks between them (as in the ebook version).

14. ruleBetweenColumns: Boolean. If true, places vertical lines between the columns in a multi-column layout.

15. distanceBetweenColumns: LaTeX length string. Sets the spacing in between columns in a multo-column layout.

16. papersize: String. Sets the dimensions of the PDF page. You can use a description such as "letterpaper" or "a4paper" (see the documentation for the LaTeX geometry package for a list), or dimensions included in curly braces for the width and height, e.g., "{8.5in,11in}".

17. landscape: Boolean. Whether or not to set the PDF page in landscape mode.

18. margin: LaTeX length string. Sets the size of margins around the PDF pages.

19. fontcommand: String. Can contain arbitrary LaTeX preamble commands meant for choosing font packages, or making other aesthetic changes. Various options can be found at the LaTeX font catalogue. Remember to escape backslashes as \\ in the JSON.

The use of multiple passes is typically used to represent different stages in the "hierarchy" of TLP. This array may have only a single element if you want to typeset the entire book in one pass, or just a single stage in the hierarchy.

You can create additional settings files of your own to create new custom versions.

tlp_index.json, index_note.tex, tlp_russells_intro.tex

These are other "master" files containing ancillary text (with content suggested by their filenames), and are sometimes required by create_tlp_latex_version.php depending on settings.

tlp_latex_custom_commands.tex

A LaTeX fragment in which various LaTeX commands used in the values inside tlp_latex.json are defined.

libtlp.php

A library of PHP functions used by create_tlp_latex_version.php.

cover.jpg

The image used as a cover if useBookCoverImage is set to true; it is also used in the ePub version. It includes the photo “Ladders” by dev null, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share-Alike 2.0 License.

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HTML/ePub related files

json_tex2html.php

This is a script which reads tlp_latex.json, converts the LaTeX mark-up, and outputs JSON with HTML-encoded values. Usage:

$ php json_tex2html.php > tlp_html.json

tlp_html.json

The most recent output of the above script. Note this file should not be edited directly. Changes should be made to tlp_latex.json, and the script rerun.

create_tlp_html_version.html

A script that uses tlp_html.json to create and output an HTML-version of the book. Typical usage:

$ php create_tlp_html_version.html > tlp.html

It can take a comma separated list of options. Currently, there are two options defined. nocolumns will typeset the different versions of the text, one after another, hyperlinked, rather than next to each other in a big table. epub will omit the javascript for the settings button/panel. These may be used together, e.g.:

$ php create_tlp_html_version.html "nocolumns,epub" > tlp-epubsource.html

The above command will produce an HTML document suitable for creating the ePub version, using calibre:

$ ebook-convert tlp-epubsource.html tlp.epub --cover cover.jpg --disable-remove-fake-margins

Note that this this script does not run json_tex2html.php, and assumes it has already been run since the most recent changes to tlp_latex.json.

tlp.css, settings_panel.css, settings_panel.js

Style sheets and javascript code included inside the HTML versions created by create_tlp_html_version.php for the side-by-side-by-side edition.

images/*

SVG and PNG versions of the diagrams in the book. These are loaded by the HTML-based versions.

libhtmltlp.php, libconverttlp.php

These are PHP function libraries needed for the scripts above.

html_substitutions.json

This file contains HTML mark-up substitutions for parts of the book where the LaTeX commands cannot be easily converted programmatically. Think of it as the HTML equivalent of tlp_latex_custom_commands.tex. It is required for json_tex2html.php.

make_all_versions.sh

This is a shell script which runs all the above to create a completely new set of files for the side-by-side-by-side website. It would only work on my computer, however, without modifications.

License

Wittgenstein's book is in the Public Domain.

This layout is released with a Creative Commons ShareAlike-Attribution 3.0 license.

The code in the scripts is GPLv3.

Kevin C. Klement klement@umass.edu