On 09/04/2011 05:09 PM, Jane Shevtsov wrote:
The appropriate deities having been propitiated, I was able to
uninstall MiKTeX and then install the latest version (the basic
installation). I then successfully used pdflatex from the command
prompt. Now, how do I connect LyX to the new MiKTeX installation?
Assuming the appropriate deities stay propitiated (they can be greedy
little buggers), start LyX, click Tools > Reconfigure, close and restart
LyX when the configuration is done and hope for the best. As a sidebar,
during reconfiguration LyX will attempt to create tiny test documents
using a zillion different LaTeX classes, most of which you will probably
never use yourself. The MiKTeX settings utility gives three choices for
what MiKTeX will do when it encounters a request for a class or style
not currently installed:
1. automatically attempt to find it on the Internet and install it;
2. automatically skip it (so that the document does not compile); or
3. ask you whether you want to install it.
During LyX reconfiguration, option #1 will slow reconfiguration to a
crawl (which is okay if you want to go off and read "War and Peace", in
the original Russian, while reconfiguring). Option #2 (my favorite)
will hasten reconfiguration, and requires minimal involvement by you,
but will leave you with a lengthy list of LyX classes marked
"unavailable". Option #3 will result in incessant nagging during the
installation. My recommendation is to run the MiKTeX package manager
before reconfiguring LyX. Look for document classes you use frequently
(for me, that's mainly article, amsarticle and beamer) and, if not
already installed, install them. Install docbook, too, even if you
don't use it; I'm pretty sure the LyX help files (or at least some of
them) do. Don't worry about style files (things like titlesec or
mdwtools); just get the key document classes. Then set MiKTeX to option
#2 and reconfigure LyX. You should end up with all your preferred
document classes available in LyX. After reconfiguring, set MiKTeX to
either option #1 or #3 (your choice), so that when you try to use a
style package (such as titlesec) that isn't installed, MiKTeX goes and
fetches it. LyX does not need to be reconfigured after adding (most)
style files, just after adding classes. (I oversimplified slightly
there -- I think some LyX layouts require both a base class and one or
more style files -- but it's close enough for now.)
Paul
