[comp.text.tex] Placement of Figures and Tables

hucker@ecn.purdue.edu (Scott Hucker) (08/11/90)

This is a LaTeX/TeX question. (I haven't been
able to answer it with my LaTex references.)

I would like to know if anybody has seen or 
done the following:  A new positioning option 
for use with tables and figures.  Lets call
it 's' for Sometimes.  A figure that was
done as
	\begin{figure}[s]
     	...stuff...
	\end{figure}
would be placed as a \begin{figure}[h] if a 
"fancy" flag was true and place at the 
End of the Chapter if the
"fancy" flag was false.  (same thing with tables)

Reason for this: A document with lots of figures 
and tables could be previewed and proofed with 
those items located near their relevant text then
the final version could be generated with those
items pushed to the end where publishers might
want to find them. 

Ideas?? Comments?

Scott Hucker
hucker@gn.ecn.purdue.edu
Purdue University
Aerospace Department

dhosek@sif.claremont.edu (Hosek, Donald A.) (08/11/90)

In article <1990Aug10.225012.23088@ecn.purdue.edu>, hucker@ecn.purdue.edu (Scott Hucker) writes...

>This is a LaTeX/TeX question. (I haven't been
>able to answer it with my LaTex references.)

>I would like to know if anybody has seen or 
>done the following:  A new positioning option 
>for use with tables and figures.  Lets call
>it 's' for Sometimes.  A figure that was
>done as
>	\begin{figure}[s]
>     	...stuff...
>	\end{figure}
>would be placed as a \begin{figure}[h] if a 
>"fancy" flag was true and place at the 
>End of the Chapter if the
>"fancy" flag was false.  (same thing with tables)

>Reason for this: A document with lots of figures 
>and tables could be previewed and proofed with 
>those items located near their relevant text then
>the final version could be generated with those
>items pushed to the end where publishers might
>want to find them. 

>Ideas?? Comments?

A better plan: LaTeX defines a macro \fps@TYPE which has the
default placement string for each type of floats. article,
report, et al define
\def\fps@figure{tbp}
\def\fps@table{tbp}

You could define a document style option floatdraft.sty, say
which has the two lines:

\def\fps@figure{hbtp}
\def\fps@table{hbtp}

to get the behaviour desired.

Homework problem 1: Why is it always a bad idea to say, e.g.,
\begin{figure}[h]
..
\end{figure}

Homework problem 2: What should floatfinal.sty look like if the
publisher wants all figures and tables at the end of the
document?

-dh

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