In its ability to generate graphical elements, TeX is basicallylimited to horizontal and vertical black rules. Extended versions such as pdfTeX add color options and, especially, the possibilityto draw more freely on the page by inserting raw code (PDF code in thecase of pdfTeX). Still, these two coding environmentsDash TeX andPDFDash are too often regarded as disjoint. It would be nice tointegrate them seamlessly, for example, to use in PDF code a color ora dimension assigned or calculated in TeX. This presentation pointsout the challenges of such a consistent and transparent TeX–PDFintegration, proposes a set of solutions, and illustrates how thesesolutions help create graphs flexibly or design pages consistently ona grid.