Re: Are 'placement' and 'float' "obsolete terms" in inline images exported to LaTeX?

["Juan Manuel Macías" <maciaschain@posteo.net>]

Ihor Radchenko writes:

>> ┌────
>> │ #+caption: Main caption
>> │ #+begin_figure
>> │ #+CAPTION: subcaption 1
>> │ #+ATTR_LaTeX: :float subfigure :placement {\textwidth} :center nil :width \textwidth
>> │ [[file:/usr/share/texmf-dist/tex/latex/mwe/example-image-a.jpg]]
>> ...
>> I think this is a case where certain elements of Org have evolved
>> (consciously or unconsciously) ahead of the names, and these names have
>> become somewhat outdated. There is not only the case of :placement. Even
>> :float seems imprecise, since can be used to create a minipage, and the
>> minipage environment is not a float environment. Would it be worth
>> making those names obsolete (with backward compatibility, of course) and
>> replacing them with slightly more precise ones? I think that new names
>> would give the user an idea of more variety of uses, like the examples I
>> have put here.
>
> I am not sure about obsolete - I see not reason to obsolete the intended
> use case. Your example is rather an abuse.

Why abuse? First, it works like a charm. Second, if :float can support
any string as an environment name, why not minipage or subfigure? As for
:placement, the term would seem more precise to me if it were really
"placement" (as :align in tables is actually "align"), not LaTeX code
passed directly after the \begin{...}. That a user can put things like
this (I do it often, and I think I'm not the only one):

:placement [htbp]\SomeExtraLaTeXCode...

it is a consequence of the above. It is not an "orthodox" use (I mean,
it's not described in the manual), but it works without problems. Again,
I don't want to seem too picky about the names, but a user who doesn't
understand the source code might think that :placement only supports
things like [htbp]. My idea here is: instead of implementing new
features, recycle and take advantage of those that arise unexpectedly
:-). Although :placement was created thinking about putting code related
to placement figures, as it is implemented I would have called it
:latex-code or something similar.


> What we might do it to introduce something like a new :wrap attribute:
>
> #+attr_latex: :wrap subfigure,{\textwidht}

That would be nice if with a single latex_attr line you could export a
single figure environment for several images, since every subfigure
environment must be inside a figure environment. And putting a single
subfigure inside a figure environment doesn't make much sense. Other
than that, the idea of :wrap is good. I find it very useful, especially
on tables.

> I think we have discussed something similar in the past, but more
> generic - allow wrapping arbitrary Org elements (headings, drawers,
> paragraphs, etc) on export.

I remember that thread. In fact, I think I created a TODO to study that,
but due to lack of time I haven't been able to take a look at it.

-- 
Juan Manuel Macías

https://juanmanuelmacias.com

https://lunotipia.juanmanuelmacias.com

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