I'd like to help

1999-12-21 Thread matt

Hello,
My name is Matt. I'm out of Florida, USA. I would like to tackle a
couple of things that it seems need to be done.
1: First, it seems that in the export section, the Postscript@ stuff
needs to be implemented more directly(as opposed to through the printing
material).
2: After that is accomplished, it occurs to me that by implementing
ps2pdf we could very rapidly implement conversion to pdf! A very useful
export format for me and hopefully others.

I am a LOUSY c++ programmer and will probably work on this forever. But
I am willing to work on it!

Any suggestions would be helpful. Knowing you guys you have already
implemented this and I'm too late.

Thanks for your time.

Matt



Re: I'd like to help

1999-12-21 Thread Allan Rae

On Tue, 21 Dec 1999, matt wrote:

> Hello,

Hello!

> My name is Matt. I'm out of Florida, USA. I would like to tackle a
> couple of things that it seems need to be done.
> 1: First, it seems that in the export section, the Postscript@ stuff
> needs to be implemented more directly(as opposed to through the printing
> material).

This has been a pretty low priority for us since I think we're all happy
to live with it.  However, it could certainly be cleaned up and should be
a fairly simple task for you as a first step into the LyX world.  Don't be
afraid to ask questions -- no matter how silly they are.  If they're
really dumb like some of mine have been everyone politely ignores them
(unless it's a Friday) and you get to figure it out for yourself.

> 2: After that is accomplished, it occurs to me that by implementing
> ps2pdf we could very rapidly implement conversion to pdf! A very useful
> export format for me and hopefully others.

We've had a discussion about this about a month ago and it seems like a
much better idea to use pdflatex and there are also have a few other
concerns related to pdf generation -- like which fonts are used -- so it
was decided that a pdf mode would be a better idea.  I can also add that
from my experience pstopdf does a better job that pdf2ps so a pdf mode is
the way to go offering ps output as an export option instead of the other
way around.

Please take a look at the archives before diving into this one.  Also I
know Lars has some good ideas for this and I was also going to take a look
at setting some groundwork for this since I too need pdf output
occasionally.

> I am a LOUSY c++ programmer and will probably work on this forever. But
> I am willing to work on it!

If you're willing to accept instruction and constructive criticism you'll
find your C++ skills improving as a result of sending in patches. I
certainly know my skills have improved over the last three years and I'm
still learning.

It would also be wise to stick to little projects initially.  I can
recommend fixing annoying bugs and seg-faults/aborts as a very good way of
getting to know the LyX code.  Although you'll probably quickly realise
that some of the code that's already there isn't "guru" quality so you'd
be welcome to offer patches cleaning things up or at least questioning why
things are implemented in a particular way.

> Any suggestions would be helpful. Knowing you guys you have already
> implemented this and I'm too late.

Not implemented yet but certainly discussed.  One of the things we
probably should attempt to do is gather up the discussions into a project
document so anyone who wants to tackle it can have a headstart and see
what everyone has already decided is A Good Thing.  There are a number of
these sorts of projects -- discussed but not documented and not underway
yet.

Oh and I mustn't forget to mention that you should read the coding rules
documentation in development/Code_rules/.  Can you use cvs to get updates
and to generate patches?  If you don't have the ability to run cvs then
you will be at a distinct disadvantage.  Although in such a case a patch
against the latest prerelease would have to suffice and one of the
developers would have to take care of merging your code.  This isn't too
much a problem though just inconvenient.

> Thanks for your time.

Thanks for _your_ time!  Did you see the Christmas present discussion from
yesterday/earlier today?

Allan. (ARRae)



Re: I'd like to help

1999-12-22 Thread Lars Gullik Bjønnes

Allan Rae <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

| > My name is Matt. I'm out of Florida, USA. I would like to tackle a
| > couple of things that it seems need to be done.
| > 1: First, it seems that in the export section, the Postscript@ stuff
| > needs to be implemented more directly(as opposed to through the printing
| > material).
| 
| This has been a pretty low priority for us since I think we're all happy
| to live with it.

I am not happy with it, but I use it so seldom that I have so far not
taken the time to clean this up.

The export targets should all have the same popup IMHO, and there you
should be able to choose where to save the exported file with the
default beeing into the same dir where the original lyx file is found.

| > 2: After that is accomplished, it occurs to me that by implementing
| > ps2pdf we could very rapidly implement conversion to pdf! A very useful
| > export format for me and hopefully others.
| 
| We've had a discussion about this about a month ago and it seems like a
| much better idea to use pdflatex and there are also have a few other
| concerns related to pdf generation -- like which fonts are used -- so it
| was decided that a pdf mode would be a better idea.

Still to have an export target "pdf" using to pstopdf,ps2pdf to do
this would not be bad.

I have making a "pdflatex" mode up there on my priority, but so far
there ahs been other things to do.

| > I am a LOUSY c++ programmer and will probably work on this forever. But
| > I am willing to work on it!
| 
| If you're willing to accept instruction and constructive criticism you'll
| find your C++ skills improving as a result of sending in patches.

And the nice thing about programming is that if you listen at
 criticism you learn _fast_ and the you will be LOUSY no more.

| It would also be wise to stick to little projects initially.  I can
| recommend fixing annoying bugs and seg-faults/aborts as a very good way of
| getting to know the LyX code.

Fixing the export could be a nice first task, but you probably need
some hours even then to get into the code.

| Not implemented yet but certainly discussed.  One of the things we
| probably should attempt to do is gather up the discussions into a project
| document so anyone who wants to tackle it can have a headstart and see
| what everyone has already decided is A Good Thing.  There are a number of
| these sorts of projects -- discussed but not documented and not underway
| yet.

This is very true, and if you look at the tasks page at
www.devel.lyx.org you will se that there is only pointer on what
should be done. Some more words discussing singular tasks how to
implement and what functionality we want would be very nice.

| Thanks for _your_ time!  Did you see the Christmas present discussion from
| yesterday/earlier today?

Hey, don't spoil by opening of gifts...

Lgb