Hi Stuart, For poster presentation and not for slides, try GIMP. For diagrams, I suggest you DIA. For plotting, I am sure you are familiar with PAW/ROOT (used especially in high energy physics and nuclear physics), or GNUplot or VTK if your field is more connected with math/engineering/computing.
I hope you will find GIMP and DIA satisfactory for your needs. Good luck and have fun! George On Mon, May 19, 2008 at 1:13 AM, Stuart Prescott < [EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Hi All, > > As a brief respite from packaging discussions, here's a user question: > > What software would you use or recommend for preparing a poster for > presentation at a conference? [0] > > A few things come to mind straight off -- perhaps existing users can make > comments on these things: > > * openoffice impress or draw: I guess these would be the same as doing a > poster in powerpoint, with the same limitations. Does it work OK? > > * inkscape: can it handle flowing and editing text nicely? I've only ever > used > it for drawing. I see it's debtagged as "works-with-format::tex" which I > find > intriguing but don't know what that means in practice. I know it has > bugs/limitations in being able to compress jpeg images which could result > in > an obscenely large PDF export when it comes to producing the final product. > > * scribus: I've never used it but by its description it sounds like a good > tool for the job; I've heard it's a bit quirky but that it's a good program > for this sort of thing. > > * LyX: is it even possible without fighting it every step of the way? > > * latex (directly): as for lyx, it would of course be possible, but is it > sensible to do so? [1] > > thoughts? comments? suggestions? > > thanks, in advance > > Stuart > > > [0] For those who don't know what I mean, it is common at scientific > conferences for a large number of attendees to "present" a poster on their > work rather than speaking about it in a seminar. The A0-sized posters are > put > up around a room, people wander about reading bits of them and the > presenters > stand near their poster to field questions. Beer and wine frequently flow. > Posters tend to be quite visual with diagrams, schematics, photos, reaction > mechanisms etc and some text to explain what's going on. > > [1] I frequently ask the same question when making presentations in latex > with > latex-beamer... if my presentations were all text, beamer would be > fantastic > for it, but since they tend to be all graphics, I find myself spending > hours > fiddling with diagrams in tikz and wonder if this really is the right tool > for the job. > > > > -- > Stuart Prescott www.nanoNANOnano.net > > > -- > To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] > with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > >
