\centerline{\bf \TeX88\ -- the proceedings}
\smallskip
\noindent
At last the proceedings! After what seems an etern\-ity,
the proceedings of the 1988 European \TeX\ Conference at
Exeter are available. I will not go into the excuses
here, since I plan to talk about the production of the
proceedings at \TeX90 at Cork. The proceedings are
published by Ellis Horwood Publishers. On the one hand
this makes them a little expensive at \quid39.95 (don't
blame me, I'm only the editor), but on the other hand, it
does mean that the production is quite good, with proper
hard covers (remember hard covers?) and none of this nasty
wire binding that locks up the book shelf. The paper
quality is good too (much better than the current paperback
edition of the \TB). I would also claim that the quality
of the papers is good, although natural modesty forbids
me from claiming that it is easily the best produced of
any of the \TeX\ conferences, either in Europe or in the
US. 

The macros described in some of the papers are available in
the Aston Archive. In addition,  the abstracts have also
been placed there, in a sort of \BibTeX-style
bibliography. To obtain information on which macros
area there, and their exact location you need to read the
file 
\begintt
[tex-archive.digests.tex88]proc.info
\endtt
The `abstracts' are in the same directory, in a file
named |abs.bib|. This last file has also been shipped to
Heidelberg, and may very well be on their server too.

TUG and the publishers are exploring ways of arranging a
discount for members. It may be possible to extent this
to other \TeX\ groups, but nothing has been finalised at
present. If you went to the conference, your copy will
either be in your hands or on its way. Fret not.
Nevertheless there are about a dozen attendees whom I have
been unable to trace. They are:
Susan C Allcock,
Josep Sarrate,
Torbj\"orn Lindh,
Ger W P M Bakker,
Mark Liederkerken,
David Hardy,
Howard Hansford,
Hubert Twum-Barima,
Jim Curry,
Harald Dahlmanns,
G{\"u}nter Unbescheid,
Neil Swindells and
John Sheppard.
If they can contact me with a current address, I'll be
pleased to see that they get their copy.

The |.bib| entry for the proceedings is:
\begintt
@proceedings{TeX88,
title={{\TeX}: Applications, {Uses}, 
            {Methods}},
year={1990},
editor={Malcolm Clark},
organization={\TeX88},
publisher={Ellis Horwood},
address={Chichester},
isbn={0139122966},
price={\pounds39.95}
\endtt

\rightline{\sl Malcolm Clark}