--- deedee <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I like LyX for complex documents because I can set a > document up > and not have to worry about the fact that so many > people who > claim to understand how to use styles don't bother > to use them > with any consistency in practice with any word > processing > software.
Then there are those who have never heard of styles and tend to use even a word processor as nothing more than an electronic typewriter. I can remember some consulting proposal deadlines where we needed to get a half-dozen CV's into a standard format. It was faster to have them reentered than try to figure out what all the spaces were doing (tabs were too sophisticated). At least the CV's were not in Excel which I have seen. > > On Thursday 25 January 2007 09:37 am, John Kane > wrote: > > Beats me but there are quite a few books out there > > done with OOo including the collaboratively > written > > OOo documentation based on a well constructed > template > > and well defined styles. > > I think "a well constructed template and well > defined styles" explains it. In this case the styles and the minimal but useful style guide was put together by a professional technical writer who had already used OOo for other work. >I've been using word processing > software for literally a couple of decades, and >frankly, the worst piece of > engineering garbage that I've ever had the > misfortune to use was > MS Word. Even OOo Writer 1.0 ran circles around it > (all released > versions of MS Word) for features and stability. > Most of the > "features" people claim are in MS Word that aren't > in OOo Writer > are really 3rd-party applications (and pricey ones > at that). Only > the grammar checker and visual basic that were in MS > Word were > not in OOo Writer 1.0. OOo Writer 2.0 is light-years > ahead of MS > Word (even with the new "features" 2007 is supposed > to come > with). > > As someone else mentioned, you are likely to bring > over MS Word's > problems when you import the file into OOo Writer > and what you're > seeing are the problems that were in your MS Word > document. I have managed to import a number of Word docs with out a problem but some imports are just plain ornery and almost impossible to fix. Plain text is about the only way to do it. What I have found is that most OOo Writer docs export to Word quite well though I occasionally have had a problem with frames. As a new LyX user I cannot comment for sure but I do think that LyX does look superiour for books and large reports but for other works (say anything under 8-10 pages and that does not need a lot of math I'd still go with OOo. > Complex MS Word files almost never look the same on > two different > computers -- even when both computers have the exact > same release > of MS Word installed. This has been a constant > complaint for both > the people trying to provide finalized documents for > production > on MS Word systems other than their own and the > people receiving > those documents. This is why savvy MS Word users > always provide a > copy of the file in PDF so that the recipient can > see what the > file was actually supposed to look like. > > Check out the Authors' Guides for OOo -- there are > versions for > 1.0 and 2.0. Getting lists and such to be stable in > OOo Writer is > not a problem, assuming you set them up correctly > for what you > want and assuming you adequately cleaned up the MS > Word file and > templates you're working from. > > http://documentation.openoffice.org/manuals/index.html > > deedee > > -- > Registered Linux User #327485 > The Writer's Place, http://www.thewritersplace.com > WordStar Users Group, http://www.wordstar2.com > __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
