Dear Randy et al, May I suggest Lyx, an open-source wysiwyg editor that outputs Latex. The interface is so much like other word processors that it is a snap to learn quickly and you get those Latex files with equations that journals, at least math and physics journals, like. Maybe you could get your colleagues to try it--I did even though I was sure I didn't want to learn Latex. I use it in Linux, where you do one of those configure-make-install-from-source- code installs. Here is the online info for using it on a mac: http://wiki.lyx.org/Mac/Mac George Reeke
On Mon, 2015-05-18 at 09:10 +0100, Randy Read wrote: > Rather off-topic, but maybe someone on the list has found a way to work > around this! > > There’s a problem with the Equation Editor in Office 2011 for Mac (i.e. the > one that is based on a stripped-down version of MathType, which you get with > Insert->Object->Microsoft Equation). You can insert an equation, re-open it > and edit it several times, and then suddenly (and seemingly randomly) the > equation object will be replaced by a picture showing the equation, which can > no longer be edited. I’m writing a rather equation-heavy paper at the > moment, and this is driving me crazy. > > This seems to be a known bug, which has existed from the release of Office > 2011. Apparently it happens, unpredictably, when an AutoSave copy of the > document is saved, so you can avoid it by turning off the AutoSave feature. > The last time this drove me crazy, several years ago, I did try turning off > AutoSave. For a while, I was very good about manually saving frequently, but > I got into bad habits and eventually Word crashed after I had worked for > several hours on a grant proposal without manually saving. So I turned > AutoSave back on. > > At the moment, the least-bad solution seems to be to turn off AutoSave while > I’m working on a document with lots of equations and then (hopefully) > remember to turn it back on after that document is finished. But it would be > great if someone has come up with a better cure for this problem. > > No doubt someone will suggest switching from Word to LaTeX, but I need to be > able to collaborate on paper-writing, and even though I might be willing to > invest the effort in learning LaTeX, I can’t really expect that of my > collaborators. Most people in our field do use Microsoft Word, regardless of > its failings. I’ve also tried using the professional version of MathType, > but that requires your collaborators to install it as well — and I don’t > think that cured the equation to picture problem anyway. > > Thanks! > > ----- > Randy J. Read > Department of Haematology, University of Cambridge > Cambridge Institute for Medical Research Tel: +44 1223 336500 > Wellcome Trust/MRC Building Fax: +44 1223 336827 > Hills Road E-mail: > rj...@cam.ac.uk > Cambridge CB2 0XY, U.K. > www-structmed.cimr.cam.ac.uk
