On Tue, 30 Nov 1999, Seak, Teng-Fong wrote:
> Jean-Marc Lasgouttes wrote:
>
> > Seak,> I just checked that actually \tensor isn't included in
> > Seak,> standard macros in tetex. But if LyX could support things like
> > Seak,> R_i{}^j{}_{kl} it's alright good enough.
> >
> > What about the following? I entered the {} by typing \ {
> >
> > JMarc
> >
> > #This file was created by <lasgoutt> Tue Nov 30 14:46:10 1999
> > [deleted]
> > \begin_inset Formula \( R_{i}{}^{j}{}_{kl} \)
> > \end_inset
>
> I don't understand quite your question. Maybe we've got some
> misunderstanding :-) Actually, I knew how to enter {}. When I ask Lyx
> to support R_i{}^j{}_{kl}, I wanted in fact LyX not to display the red {}
> to make the tensor look a bit better.
There are two quite orthogonal issues here:
Q: What does LyX *allow* you to enter, to enable you to produce the most
neatly typeset mathematical documents?
A: LyX, by allowing you access to the underlying LaTeX and TeX commands,
allows you to typeset anything at all.
Q: To what extent does LyX make this easier than directly entering the TeX
commands, and how well does it preview it on-screen?
A: There are various limiting factors here:
1) Availability of font characters: LyX uses a set of X-windows fonts.
These have in them some approximation to many of the commonly wanted
characters in mathematical notation, but by no means all of them. LyX will
not be able to support the others without new fonts - and possibly a more
extendable font system.
2) Previewing complex things may not be worth it. TeX is an extremely
complex system, dealing well with a variety of very complex on-page
display issues. It may not be appropriate for LyX to attempt to solve
some of these complex problems independently -- it's only intended to be a
WYSIWYG previewer.
Tangentially to that, there's the more general question of exactly which
job LyX is trying to solve. At the moment (at least for complex
mathmematically documents) LyX is best thought of as a helpful tool for
writing LaTeX, but the author needs to know, or at least be willing to
learn as he goes along, LaTeX in order to acheive more complex effects.
LyX is essentially a LaTeX front-end.
I would quite like, personally, a LyX-like program which is a more generic
'structured' document editor. Probably an XML editor, with the ability to
backend onto LaTeX, but also other formats. If I have time, I may have a
look at that problem.
Jules
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