

LyX: Open-source word processor for mathematicians/academics - lunchbox
http://www.lyx.org/

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redsymbol
I wrote two small math books in LyX: <http://hilomath.com>

It was interesting. It's nice in a lot of ways; LyX manages to combine the
kind of continuous preview you get with a full WYSIWYG word processor with the
more abstract organizational features of LaTex. Not to mention the kick ass
typesetting quality, especially for math.

The current site (which I'm a bit embarrassed to show - I have a much nicer
looking one in the works) is generated from the LyX source, as a bunch of
mostly static php pages. Its replacement is a django site that is also fully
generated; I just type 'make site', which exports LyX to latex, converts to
html via latex2html, and so on.

I have a plan for a third book. And as nice as LyX is, I'm wondering if I want
to try docbook or something for it. The reason is I found it sometimes hard to
convert things fully into an html document that fully takes advantage of the
medium. LaTeX (and hence LyX) was made first and foremost for documents that
are physically printed, and sometimes there's an impedance mismatch.

But LyX ain't bad, and I doubt any alternative is a magic bullet. Anyone have
any experience writing books like this? What do you use?

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yummyfajitas
LyX is nice, but I eventually got frustrated with it and went back to
emacs+xdvi. Nothing beats a well-customized emacs for me.

Emacs actually has similar functionality to LyX (I don't use it, so I don't
know how well it works) in preview-latex:

<http://www.gnu.org/software/auctex/preview-latex.html>

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maximilian
I got frustrated with it and just use TextMate. It has a latex-typeset
command. It was command-B, but its command-E now I think. It integrates really
well with BibTex with autocompletion of sources. I setup some nice macros to
auto do certain mundane typing tasks and all-in-all I really like it.

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ejs
This looks pretty good, been looking for something a little more powerful then
open office for research papers.

This looks like it may fit the bill without making it completely text based
like *TEX.

~~~
lunchbox
Right. LyX is a graphical front-end to LaTeX, meaning it can do virtually
anything LaTeX can do. I'm a pretty avid user, since I also find that
Word/OpenOffice lack many features that scientists use.

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jrockway
There is also GNU Texmacs:

<http://www.texmacs.org/>

It's excellent, but from what I can tell it's neither TeX nor Emacs. An odd
name, but good software nonetheless. (You can export to TeX if you want, but
that's not its native format.)

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technoguyrob
I use EXP because it lets me write about 25% faster than I write by hand (with
a bunch of macros and keyboard shortcuts I don't even the mouse to click on
various symbols, like most WYSIWYG editors).

<http://www.expswp.com/>

I wrote the following in about a cumulative hour using EXP:

<http://math.uic.edu/~robertk/files/mth504_notes.pdf>

I've used and seen many people use various math typesetting editors, and from
my experience EXP lets you be the most productive (not good for research
papers, but very good for writing homework, notes, etc.).

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randomhack
Hmm looks kind of expensive though. Does it really justify the price?

~~~
technoguyrob
Oh, right. I got it for free. :)

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binglo
I love LaTeX for docs that simply use one of the built-in documentclasses --
and which use no extra packages or custom commands or environments.

I strongly dislike it for anything else. Getting anything non-default to work
right has always been a major headache for me.

Also, conversion to html should be easier. Last time I looked, latex2html was
pretty much unmaintained and also a bear to even get installed (if your OS
doesn't already provide a package for it).

Texinfo might be a good substitute for LaTeX, but it's a bit clunky with
manually specifying menus (nodes and sections)... though I know that Emacs
will do that for you.

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naish
TexShop (<http://www.uoregon.edu/~koch/texshop/>) is nice if you are writing
on a Mac. The editor is not quite as nice as TextMate, but everything is
nicely integrated.

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ComputerGuru
Putting aside any possible biases, anyone interested in an easy to use LaTeX-
like program should give Microsoft's Word 2007 a shot. The new equation editor
and symbols functionality is quite powerful, and incredibly easy to use.

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jrockway
Easier to use than typing something like:

    
    
      Here is an equation: $y = x^{2x + 1}$.
    

Probably not. GUIs trade learning for speed. You never have to learn anything,
but you'll never be fast. The GUI will always be in your way, slowing down
your work. TeX is the opposite -- you have to read a lot to get started, but
then the only difficult or tedious part of writing will be the subject matter
you're writing about. The only barrier between your mind and beautiful output
will be your slow fingers :)

LyX and Texmacs are a good compromise, however. You can write the code when
you're comfortable doing so, but you can click stuff when you're learning.

~~~
ComputerGuru
I still maintain its easier to get your professor or colleagues to upgrade to
Word 2007 than to convince them to learn LaTeX.

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avinashv
Weird. I haven't had a college professor who has to typeset mathematical
equations who _doesn't_ know LaTeX.

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hugh
Perhaps he could have said "It's easier to get your _students_ to upgrade to
Word 2007 than to use LaTeX".

Which would be true. However, it's a much better _idea_ to get them to use
LaTeX.

