Suggestion: Offer Emacs manual, org-mode manual, org-guide in double-sided fashion for printing

Suggestion: Offer Emacs manual, org-mode manual, org-guide in double-sided fashion for printing

[Jan Teubel]

Hello from East Germany!

This email is not a bug report, but a polite suggestion to
provide/offer Emacs manual, org-mode manual and org-guide in
double-sided fashion for printing (PDF files).

I would like to print out the whole Emacs manual, org-mode manual and
org-guide on paper in double-sided fashion using the provided PDF
files [1][2]. In the PDF file of the Emacs and org-mode manuals (and
org-guide), every page number is located on the right side, which is
only suitable for single-sided printing (in my opinion). That is why I
have refrained from printing the whole manuals.

What I need is: when I open the printed manuals and see two pages
(left and right page), that the page number of the left page
(even-numbered) is located on the left side, and the page number of
the right page (odd numbered) is located on the right side. (Exactly
like an opened book when it lies on a table.)

How to achieve the correct location of the page number of each page
for double-sided printing: According to the appendix E of the texinfo
manual [3], one has to add the the line "@setchapternewpage odd" after
the line "@titlepage".

In the emacs.texi file at line 81 is located "@titlepage" and at line
82 I added "@setchapternewpage odd" according to [3], so it looks like
this:

[...]
@titlepage
@setchapternewpage odd
@sp 6
@center @titlefont{GNU Emacs Manual}
@sp 4
@center @value{EDITION} Edition, Updated for Emacs Version @value{EMACSVER}.
[...]

This modification produces the desired double-sided PDF file. I don't
know whether just adding "@setchapternewpage odd" after "@titlepage"
is the correct way to produce double-sided PDF files, but it works.

(The "@titlepage" line in orgguide.texi and in org.texi is located in
both files at line 11.)

I am asking you whether you can provide additional PDF files at [1][2]
in double-sided fashion or whether you can replace the current
(single-sided) PDF manuals with manuals in double-sided fashion.

I can produce the double-sided fashion manuals on my own, but I very
much prefer to rely on an officially provided manual from the Emacs
and org-mode team than relying on my own produced make-shift PDF
files.

Thank you very much! I apologize for my bad English and I hope this
email makes sense.

With best regards from East Germany!
Jan Teubel


[1]: https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/emacs.html
[2]: https://orgmode.org/#docs
[3]: https://www.gnu.org/software/texinfo/manual/texinfo/html_node/Heading-Choice.html

Re: bug#42199: Suggestion: Offer Emacs manual, org-mode manual, org-guide in double-sided fashion for printing

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Jan Teubel <teubel.jan@gmail.com>
> Date: Sat, 4 Jul 2020 12:44:09 +0000
> 
> This email is not a bug report, but a polite suggestion to
> provide/offer Emacs manual, org-mode manual and org-guide in
> double-sided fashion for printing (PDF files).
> 
> I would like to print out the whole Emacs manual, org-mode manual and
> org-guide on paper in double-sided fashion using the provided PDF
> files [1][2]. In the PDF file of the Emacs and org-mode manuals (and
> org-guide), every page number is located on the right side, which is
> only suitable for single-sided printing (in my opinion). That is why I
> have refrained from printing the whole manuals.

We don't provide the PDF files in the Emacs tarballs.  We provide the
Texinfo sources.  So you should be able to modify the Texinfo as you
describe, and then print the manuals as you'd like.

IOW, I don't think I understand why there's a need to make a change in
Emacs to support your request: you can do that yourself.

Am I missing something?