----- Original Message -----
From: "Rich Shepard" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <lyx-users@lists.lyx.org>
Sent: Sunday, January 29, 2006 9:20 AM
Subject: Re: A Newbie's Experience with LyX
On Sun, 29 Jan 2006, Martin A. Hansen wrote:
i would love to hear the developers (and others) oppinion on the raised
issues.
martin,
I've not read the OP's blog so I cannot directly comment on specific
issues
raised. However, I will share my initial reaction to reading the original
post: Why use a typesetting system designed for text-heavy printed
documents
to produce HTML for Web pages?
IMO, writing HTML is no different in purpose than writing code in other
programming languages such as C and Python. I believe that a text editor
is
the appropriate tool for the task, not LyX or LaTeX. This reminds me of
experiences more than a decade ago when I had the misfortune to try to
work
with people who insisted on using a spreadsheet as a data repository and
reporting tool when what they needed was a fully relational database
management system.
While I'm sure that others will strongly disagree with me, I think that
LyX
is the wrong tool to prepare Web pages, just as I think it's the wrong
tool
to do visually intensive page layout (use Scribus for that).
Rich
Why use a typesetting system designed for text-heavy printed documents to
produce HTML for Web pages?
SH: Actually, I think it is a fairly widely held opinion that
TeX->LaTeX->LyX are superb tools for the creation of
documents with mathematical and logical equations. I quote
the LyX Wiki below to support this point of view, but it
is a pov held outside the LyX community as well.
MS Word's equation editor used to be poor as well as there
was a problem with larger docs and Master Document. Even
WordPerfect's equation editor was better. Most technical
writers used costly FrameMaker, usually with Quadralay.
There were thousands of mathematical and logic books typeset
with TeX as mentioned below, but I imagine earlier they used
(X)Emacs. For papers and thesis projects, WinEdt and LyX
are far better tools (than FrameMaker for Unix/Windows) but
LyX is $49 +tax cheaper == free.
There are tens of thousands of webpages related to fractals,
Physics, Maths etc then display equations. The issue is not
editing a webpage in an editor, but creating or converting
webpages which contain mathematical equations and diagrams.
Not every homepage owner wants to load a pdf doc, they
want the option of using .html. If there is a typo it is easier
to fix in .html format than editing a .pdf format doc. And
apparently there is demand for conversion to .html from
customers because Word and Adobe Acrobat ($400+)
offer that feature. So TeX->LaTeX->LyX offer conversion
for free. LyX export as Latex and then htlatex foo(.tex)=html.
Latex2html is not easy to set up on Windows even though
experts like JP can do it. htlatex is easy, and it plays to LyX's
strength of equation typesetting. It took me 30 seconds to
convert xypic.tex and ten minutes to search and replace a
conversion error which produced "LY X" rather than LyX.
There were no ligature problems (I have seen such though).
H. Peter Gumm wrote a nice LyX tutorial, "Using XYpic in LYX"
http://www.mathematik.uni-marburg.de/~gumm/LyX/xypic/xypic.pdf
I will send the converted html file (.mht) to anybody who wants it.
Converting a LyX created math/logic/diagram to .html format
is where LyX shines and there is a demand and an appreciation.
Yoland's example didn't demonstrate LyX's major strength which
is when a person does want to create an html doc, _not_ with a
text editor or some specialized html program (poor at equations).
It turned out that Acrobat conversion of xypic.pdf to html failed
very miserably. The free htlatex method involving LyX for math
was nearly perfect.
Because Yoland's example used a "text-heavy" document in order
to produce html, doesn't weaken LyX's strength for 'math-heavy'
documents in order to produce html. I've seen *many* such pages.
Your criticism seemed to have a more general scope of use, rather
than applying specifically to Yoland's less than optimal leverage.
I didn't see much appreciation for LyX's math capability->html.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
http://wiki.lyx.org/FAQ/FAQ
What is Tex
"Donald E. Knuth, a mathematician and computer scientist,
developed the TeX typesetting system "for the creation of
beautiful books--and especially for books that contain a
lot of mathematics." His brilliant work was a resounding
success, and some variant of TeX is now used by most
professional mathematicians. If you pick a random mathematics
book published in the last five years, the chances are good
that it was formatted with TeX.
What is LaTeX
Leslie Lamport created LaTeX as a structured, high-level
interface to TeX. Technically, LaTeX is a large macro
package that loads on top of TeX. ... In particular, the
American Mathematical Society has sponsored the development
of a package named "amsmath" that simplifies the typesetting
of complicated mathematical expressions."
http://www.lyx.org/
"LyX is designed for scientists by scientists, and it shows, in
world-class support for math and structured document creation.
Such staples of scientific authoring as reference list and index
creation come standard. But you don't have to be a scientist:
with LyX you create just as easily a letter or a novel or a
theatre play or film script. A broad array of ready, well
designed document layouts and style modification and feature
support packages are built in."
--------------------------------------------------------
The last paragraph above seems more balanced to me.
Rich: Why use a typesetting system designed for text-heavy printed
documents to produce HTML for Web pages?
SH: Because it is also designed for equations and math/sci. webpages.
Regards,
Stephen
