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1Donald Knuth has spent the past several years working on a
2system allowing him to control many aspects of the design
3of his forthcoming books|=|from the typesetting and layout
4down to the very shapes of the letters! Seldom has an
5author had anything remotely like this power to control the
6final appearance of his or her work. Knuth's \TEX\
7typesetting system has become well|-|known and is available in
8many countries around the world. By contrast, his
9\METAFONT\ system for designing families of typefaces has
10not become as well known or as available.
11
12In his article \quotation {The Concept of a Meta|-|Font},
13Knuth sets forth for the first time the underlying
14philosophy of \METAFONT, as well as some of its products.
15Not only is the concept exciting and clearly well executed,
16but in my opinion the article is charmingly written as well.
17However, despite my overall enthusiasm for Knuth's idea and
18article, there are some points in it that I feel might be
19taken wrongly by many readers, and since they are points
20that touch close to my deepest interests in artificial
21intelligence and esthetic theory, I felt compelled to make
22some comments to clarify certain important issues raised by
23\quotation {The Concept of a Meta|-|Font}.
24