On Sun, 2010-02-07 at 16:39 -0700, John Doty wrote: > On Feb 7, 2010, at 3:38 PM, Peter Clifton wrote: > > > Lyx has its own file format, but it can export to various flavours of > > LaTeX (IE.. code for plain latex, pdflatex). > > > > Similarly, "File->Export->PDF (pdflatex)" is all you need to produce a > > document - not sure if it can be driven via the command line or not. > > What if the hand is 10,000 km from the mouse? What if the "user" is a > script? This is why I'm so skeptical of "integrated" GUI > environments: they get in the way of automated flow.
I'm previewing typeset work - I'm working in a GUI environment, so yes.. the mouse is next to my hand. If you're happy checking your output on a xterm, please go right ahead and use emacs + LaTeX. > LaTeX works so well in an automated flow with things like gEDA: why > don't the LyX developers get this? It *should* be so easy. It is in Lyx.. as far as I can tell. If you wanted to do your "TeX" bit from within Lyx, using Lyx as an editor exporting LaTeX code, then you can still happily integrate "make" based work-flows with it. - merge output from gEDA etc.. A cursory look at "lyx --help" also suggests that it can execute "lyx commands", import / export from the command line... sounds like it can be used in an automated work-flow to me. You can completely customise the file-translators Lyx uses to import and convert graphics - all based in calling external programs. Lyx really is a well engineered piece of software. (Also, Lyx's file-format is ASCII based). > But this is completely normal: developers of specialized GUI tools *almost > always* lose sight of the bigger picture. I plead that this not > happen to gEDA. Developers of specialised GUI tools cater for users who wish to work from within such a tool. Just because you don't necessarily want to do that, doesn't make the idea invalid. It is nice that in this case, the GUI tool can cater for automated work-flows. Regards, Peter C. _______________________________________________ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user