Just to play devil's advocate for a second, Word these days does use a text-based format (actually a gzipped tarball of XML files?) so it's a bit more resistant to corruption compared to their old, bad, proprietary format.
Offtopic: when the hell did people start topposting around here? On Tue, Jul 26, 2016 at 9:43 AM Derek Smithies <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi, > > having watched a number of students at the university struggle with > latex, I think there are two big issues. > > 1. The mindset change - allowing the typesetting language (which is what > latex is) to layout the text to give nice documents > > 2. figure placement. If the document contains too many figures for the > quantity of text, all the figures go to the end of the document. - not > what is required. > > The realisation that that computer will track all referencing, figure > numbering, added figures and just renumbers, table of contents > generation, - that is nice. > > Having watched people use word, > it is kinda sad when they say they have lost everything because the > computer died and everything was in one big document and it was all bad.. > > watch someone work with word and manually go through the document and > change all the numbering cause the sections were moved. painful. > > ============== > > There are a number of word haters out there, who used word 10 years ago. > and base their opinions on it back then. Word has improved a lot over > the years. > > I am told that word's formatting and spacing is a lot better, equation > handling is better. Apparently, word has a latex processor which allows > it to read equations (pasted as latex) > and display them as intended. Which shows how good the underlying format > (latex) is. > > However, latex is based on tex, which is a direct implementation of the > rules of correct typesetting. I like correct typesetting - it looks better. > > Word is always going to be inferior to latex, as latex guarantees (100%) > that the text of the document is available. Always. (ignoring disk > crashes etc, but that is not the fault of latex). > > Cheers, > Derek. > > On 25/07/16 22:51, Helmut Walle wrote: > > Hm, it's not quite as simple as that... LyX in the end just uses LaTeX > > under the hood. While LyX allows you to get some output quicker than > > starting with LaTeX itself, its functionality is limited in some > > regards. In particular, if you need to use any LaTeX packages that are > > not part of the standard LaTeX distribution, then you will still need > > to know how to use them, because while you can use them in LyX it does > > require that you are writing the input for them in literal LaTeX code > > (which is supported by LyX all right), so that if you really want to > > get decent mileage out of LyX you will still have to learn LaTeX. > > > > To illustrate the point in terms of its practical relevance, let's say > > you insert a table - LyX does that all right. Now the table gets a bit > > longer and doesn't fit onto a single page in the PDF output anymore. > > The standard LaTeX answer to this is to use the supertabular style. > > But that is not a part of LyX. So you need to load it manually and > > write the input manually... but if you can do that, then writing the > > rest of the document in LaTeX should be easy. > > > > But if you need to learn LaTeX anyway it will be a lot quicker and > > easier copying the boilerplate stuff from some example, and then just > > writing the rest of the input in your preferred text editor (the > > obvious choice being EMACS, together with the auctex mode for LaTeX > > language support). > > > > Finally, LyX is not the only attempt to create a WYSIWYG editor around > > LaTeX or TeX. I have had a look at a few of them in the past and have > > forgotten their names - the real appeal of LaTeX is that usually it's > > so good at layout that you don't have to worry about that aspect of > > publishing very much, and you can focus on your content by using a > > text editor. With appropriate language support that is also a lot > > faster than having to move a mouse around in a clicky environment of > > any kind. > > > > Kind regards, > > > > Helmut. > > > > On 25/07/16 17:33, Christopher Sawtell wrote: > >> http://www.lyx.org > >> > >> As far as I'm aware, this will do everything you mention. > >> > >> ( IMHO it's the answer to every [maiden] type-setter's dream. ) > >> ( You don't have to learn any TeX etc. gibberish ) > >> > >> > >> > >> > >> On 25 July 2016 at 09:41, Jim Cheetham <[email protected] > >> <mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: > >> > >> >> On Sun, Jul 24, 2016 at 5:00 PM, Ross Drummond > >> <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> > >> >> wrote: > >> >>> I have an acquaintance who who maintains some reference > >> document in > >> >>> various forms. He produces identical documents in HTML PDF > >> and DOC > >> >>> formats. > >> > >> Here's what my Asciidoc makefile does : > >> a2x -f text document.adoc > >> a2x -f pdf -k document.adoc --dblatex-opts="-P > >> doc.publisher.show=0 -P > >> latex.output.revhistory=0" > >> a2x -f xhtml document.adoc -a icons -a toc -a data-uri > >> > >> I'm also using the same make process to generate different > >> versions of > >> diagrams using graphviz, mscgen and asciio + asciitosvg. See the > >> discussion on the ZeroMQ Guide to see another example of this > >> sort of > >> publishing chain > >> http://zguide.zeromq.org/page:all#Removing-Friction > >> > >> -jim > >> _______________________________________________ > > [...] > > > >> Sincerely, > >> Christopher Sawtell > > _______________________________________________ > > Linux-users mailing list > > [email protected] > > http://lists.canterbury.ac.nz/mailman/listinfo/linux-users > > -- > Sent from my Ubuntu computer > > _______________________________________________ > Linux-users mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.canterbury.ac.nz/mailman/listinfo/linux-users >
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