Hum... This looks to me like another Holy War.
Let me add my little bit of flame. To give everyone his due, let me say that I also despise MSW*rd, precisely because I know how to use it (I used to work with it as the formatter of a couple of tiny little journals, and its most recent feat is that the freaky thing just ate all the footnotes of my dissertation). That's why I've been wondering in the LaTeX world for a while. Now that LyX seems to be reaching more portability, I came back to use it as a GUI for my LaTeX documents. If you want to write letters, fliers, and the like, stuck to WordPad, if you're tied to the WinWorld for some reason (like your employer/school commitments). Writing this sort of things with MSW*rd OR LyX seems to me like trying to shoot down flies with a bazooka. For anything more complex (reports, books, journals, directories...), LyX/LaTeX is the choice, for an awful lot of reasons (price, portability, stability, even technical support ;-)... But remember, fellows: all software sucks, all hardware sucks... --- Steve Litt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On Thursday 28 April 2005 07:13 am, Helge Hafting wrote: > > Steve Litt wrote: > > >On Monday 18 April 2005 02:33 am, Alexander Blüm wrote: > > >>hello, > > >> > > >>I am still a convinced LyX user and I've "infected" a few people > around > > >>me to use it aswell. My girlfriend uses it for all kinds of > documents > > >>now and gets good grades for homework (the professor likes the > the > > >>layout - hehe). > > >>But I've also met a few very stubborn people, like most of my > school. > > >>They say that you can solve any problem you're approaching with > > >>WORD2000... > > >>I'm running out of arguments.. They've not even tried LyX and > knock it > > >>already. Any good arguments why one should use LyX instead of > word? > > > > > >I think a person should use Word (or in my case OpenOffice) for > most > > > stuff. If it's under 10,000 words, LyX is a hassle unless you're > willing > > > to accept ALL LyX's defaults. > > > > Lyx is lacking when it comes to customization, but you don't > > have to accept "ALL defaults". There is a limited selection of > > fonts and sizes for example. There are several pages of other > > changeable stuff in the document layout dialog, although other > > word processors indeed have much more. > > > > And there are quite a few things that can be achieved by 1-2 > > simple latex commands in the preamble. Simple stuff that you don't > > need to learn latex to use - just look it up on the web or the > > lyx mailing list archives. > > > > Bigger changes are harder - you either learn latex or you > > don't do them. Take the trouble of making your own lyx layout > > and it can be used for small documents as well as large. > > > > I have found that I don't need to write documents in many > > very different styles, so taking the trouble once sorted things > > out for years. So I use lyx for everything except e-mail. From > > the word documents I see, it seems that people "just use the > defaults" > > when using word too. Word seems to have one particularly nasty > > looking default - ragged-right text. That's what I see in > > every word document that comes my way - I believe word > > can do justified text, but I have yet to see anyone use it. > > > > A reason for not using word is the way word can screw up a > > document in unexpected ways. Two years in a row, the word > > users here have managed to _print_ a course catalog where > > the table of contents listed all content with the same page > > number througout. (Actually, the first page of TOC was > > okay, but at some point the page numbers didn't > > change any more.) Lyx just don't do that sort of thing, so > > you don't have to look for it while proofreading. Fix a spelling > > issue or some very minor formatting issue somewhere, and > > word _may_ scramble the TOC or something else that was fine > > the last round. > > > Here's an example. I need a URL style for my book. I want it small, > bold and > underlined. This would be 2 minutes in WordPerfect 5.1 (the > wordprocessor > whose styles I'm most familiar with). > > In LyX, I don't have it yet, in spite of trying all the suggestions > on the LyX > list. Herbert's came the closest, but when there were 2 URLs in a > row, > Herbert's solution concatinated them into a single line. > > I've spent about 10 hours trying to get a URL style. I can write that > off in > the production of a book, but on a 10,000 word document it would add > 20% to > the authoring time. > > By the way, I finally just gave up on the underlining. > > SteveT > > Steve Litt > Author: > * Universal Troubleshooting Process courseware > * Troubleshooting Techniques of the Successful Technologist > * Rapid Learning: Secret Weapon of the Successful Technologist > Webmaster > * Troubleshooters.Com > * http://www.troubleshooters.com > > (Legal Disclaimer) Follow these suggestions at your own risk. > __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
