That was more than helpful. The organization-specific aspect hadn't occurred to me, and of course makes sense. As a graduate student I like to create a lot of memos for research notes, homework assignments, etc. but they are all in-house so formatting doesn't matter greatly.
Cheers and thanks for your time! -Kevin On Tue, Jun 22, 2010 at 3:41 PM, Paul A. Rubin <[email protected]> wrote: > On 6/22/2010 7:09 AM, Kevin Foster wrote: > >> Hello all, >> >> I've very new to LyX and somewhat new to LaTeX. Can anyone comment on >> the existence of memo templates? The selection of user-created >> templates <http://wiki.lyx.org/Layouts/Layouts> i found (layouts? same >> thing right?) >> > > No. Layouts tell LyX how to handle document classes (mainly how to display > them, what environments to allow, etc., with some ability to customize the > document class within the layout file). Templates are prefab "fill in the > blanks" documents. Essentially, a template is just an ordinary LyX > document. If you open it with File > Open, you can edit it. If you choose > File > New from Template and select that document, LyX opens it but with a > different file name (the generic "newfile<#>.lyx" name), so that you won't > accidentally overwrite it if you make changes and do a save operation. > > is surprisingly sparse given LyX's enthusiastic user >> base... as several previous commenters on this list have noted, the >> absence of a simple "memo" template is a shame. This thread >> <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/msg28646.html> sums >> it up best. >> > > I haven't read the thread, but I'm not particularly surprised -- memos > frequently need to observe some formatting rules/preferences established by > the author's organization (e.g., first page on the organization's > letterhead). > > >> Are there many layouts out there elsewhere on the site that I'm missing? >> Do I just have to read the documentation and create my own layout? >> > > Unless you have to do something funky, it's a lot easier to create a > template than to create a layout -- a layout makes sense mostly if you have > tracked down a third party LaTeX document class (or created your own). > > If you want to create something fancy, you might start with > http://www.ctan.org/tex-archive/help/Catalogue/bytopic.html#letters. > Search for "memo" (sadly having to skip over quite a few hits on "memoir") > and see if anything tickles your fancy. > > > I >> recognize that it's not a very difficult process, but for new users it >> would be nice if more shared layouts were on the wiki. Of course i'm >> happy to post whatever i come up with once i figure it out... just >> surprised there aren't memo layouts up already :) >> > > My guess is that memo layouts (as opposed to templates) will be highly > customized to the user's environment (and preferences). I'm attaching a > bare bones, plain paper memo template I use for within-office, > don't-sweat-the-letterhead stuff. Change my name to your (or whatever > pseudonym you want to use), futz with choice of language, paper size, > preferred fonts etc. in Document > Settings, and save it someplace. Then use > File > New from Template to load a copy of it and memo away. > > HTH, > Paul > >
