enctex
Provides input encoding translation capabilities for TeX, enabling seamless handling of various character encodings and input formats.
Overview
Operates at the fundamental TeX level to transform input text before processing, making it particularly valuable for handling international text and special character encodings.
- Specializes in translating multibyte character sequences, with robust support for UTF-8 encoding.
- Enables direct input of non-ASCII characters without requiring manual conversion or escape sequences.
- Particularly useful for documents containing multiple languages or special characters that aren't natively supported by standard TeX.
- Implements translation at the change-file level, ensuring efficient and reliable character handling during document processing.
Getting Started
The enctex package is a TeX extension that provides input translation capabilities. It is not a LaTeX package that you include directly in your documents, but rather a component of your TeX distribution.
No special setup is required in your LaTeX documents to use the functionality provided by enctex. It works at the engine level to handle input encoding translation, particularly for multibyte sequences like UTF-8.
Examples
Using encTeX to handle UTF-8 encoded input in a plain TeX document.
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage{textgreek}
\begin{document}
This document demonstrates UTF-8 encoding support. You can include characters like:
• é (accented e)
• ö (umlaut o)
• ñ (n with tilde)
• € (euro symbol)
• \textalpha{} \textbeta{} \textgamma{} (Greek letters)
These characters are properly processed thanks to the encTeX extension working behind the scenes with the inputenc package.
\end{document}Creating a multilingual document with encTeX's UTF-8 support.
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage{babel}
\begin{document}
\section{Multilingual Text Support}
English: Hello World!
French: Bonjour le monde! (with accents: é, è, ê, ç)
German: Hallo Welt! (with umlauts: ä, ö, ü)
Spanish: ¡Hola Mundo! (with ñ and ¿¡)
Russian transliteration: Privet, mir!
The encTeX extension helps TeX process these UTF-8 encoded characters correctly.
\end{document}