This manual page is not meant to be exhaustive. The complete
documentation for this version of TeX can be found in the info file
or manual
Web2C: A TeX implementation.
The AmSTeX language is described in the book
The Joy of TeX for nroff.
AmSTeX is a TeX macro package, not a modification to the TeX source
program, so all the capabilities described in
tex(1)
are present.
The AmSTeX macros encourage writers to think about the content of their
documents, rather than the form. The ideal, not always realized, is to
have no formatting commands (like ``switch to italic'' or ``skip 2
picas'') in the document at all; instead, everything is done
by specific markup instructions: ``emphasize'', ``start a section''.
AmSTeX is the official typesetting system of the American Mathematical
Society, and nearly all of its publications are typeset using AmSTeX. The
online version of AMS Math Reviews uses AmSTeX input syntax for display of
mathematical material. AMS authors can provide editors with
computer-readable AmSTeX files.
For authors more familiar with LaTeX, an AMS-supported package called
amsmath.sty
is is available.