Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-07, rgheck wrote:
 José Matos wrote:
 On Friday 06 March 2009 13:57:34 Guenter Milde wrote:

 This would be moot if the paragraph had some kind of special markup, like:

 \begin{standard}
 ...
 \end{standard}

 or even

 \standard{...} if you prefer.

Thinking about it, I found that LaTeX already has this.
You can write a three-paragraph document as:

\documentclass{article}
\begin{document}
\section{heading}
\par{first paragraph}\par{second paragraph}\par{a last
long paragraph}
\end{document}

The empty line is just an alias for improved readability.
(And I would like LyX to continue using it in LaTeX output.)

 That would allow to leave space for new declarations outside of
 paragraphs, or for placing a float without affecting near paragraphs.

 I think this is all the more true of \section, which is really an 
 environment, in the sense that it has a defined beginning AND END. 

Sorry, I cannot follow here: using the term environment for an object
that cannot be written in \begin{section} ... \end{section} form is
misleading. And every object (be it inline or box object) has a defined
beginning and end. Only command switches (like \bfseries or \appendix)
have no end.

 I can well imagine a system under which sections, and other document 
 divisions, were insets, and

Yes, it is feasible to use insets for all objects. But I am not sure
wheter it is wise.

Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-07, rgheck wrote:
> José Matos wrote:
>> On Friday 06 March 2009 13:57:34 Guenter Milde wrote:

>> This would be moot if the paragraph had some kind of special markup, like:

>> \begin{standard}
>> ...
>> \end{standard}

>> or even

>> \standard{...} if you prefer.

Thinking about it, I found that LaTeX already has this.
You can write a three-paragraph document as:

\documentclass{article}
\begin{document}
\section{heading}
\par{first paragraph}\par{second paragraph}\par{a last
long paragraph}
\end{document}

The empty line is just an alias for improved readability.
(And I would like LyX to continue using it in LaTeX output.)

>> That would allow to leave space for new declarations outside of
>> paragraphs, or for placing a float without affecting near paragraphs.

> I think this is all the more true of \section, which is really an 
> environment, in the sense that it has a defined beginning AND END. 

Sorry, I cannot follow here: using the term environment for an object
that cannot be written in \begin{section} ... \end{section} form is
misleading. And every object (be it inline or box object) has a defined
beginning and end. Only command switches (like \bfseries or \appendix)
have no end.

> I can well imagine a system under which sections, and other document 
> divisions, were insets, and

Yes, it is feasible to use insets for all objects. But I am not sure
wheter it is wise.

Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Lars Gullik Bjønnes]

Abdelrazak Younes you...@lyx.org writes:

| a bit like XML :-)

I clearly remember who helped shoot that one down.

-- 
Lgb

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jean-Marc Lasgouttes]

lar...@gullik.org (Lars Gullik Bjønnes) writes:
 Abdelrazak Younes you...@lyx.org writes:
 | a bit like XML :-)

 I clearly remember who helped shoot that one down.

Hmm, I feel a nice Friday thread brewing.

JMarc

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-06, Abdelrazak Younes wrote:
 Vincent van Ravesteijn wrote:
 rgheck schreef:
 This is the same issue as with InsetOptArg. It shouldn't be an inset. 
 It's a layout feature.

 Richard

 That's why I would like to see this difference to disappear. 

I'd rather like to see the difference made clear.

Layouts are block elements, you cannot have two layouts in one
paragraph.

Insets are  inline elements (even if they sometimes contain block
elements.

 Why is a note an Inset and the title an layout ? Why is a branch an
 inset and the abstract a layout ? 

You can have a title in a note and a note in a title. But you cannot
have an abstract in a title or a title in an abstact.

 Why do we have a lyxcode layout and a listings insets ? etc.

The listings inset should indeed preferabely be a layout (as the
lstlistings environment is a block element). 
  However, the inset has some additional features that might be needed
for listings...

Another example are Container Environments like slides of a
presentation. LyX' model for environment-type layouts not suited for
LaTeX environments that are wrappers around other styles.  The hack with
the --- Separator --- style is not needed if you use an Inset for these
environments instead.  The question is how I can obsolete a Style by an
Inset so that documents are updated to the new layout.

Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jean-Marc Lasgouttes]

Guenter Milde mi...@users.berlios.de writes:
 I'd rather like to see the difference made clear.

 Layouts are block elements, you cannot have two layouts in one
 paragraph.

 Insets are  inline elements (even if they sometimes contain block
 elements.

Yes, and HTML shows well this distinction. However, I have failed
numerous times to explain the distinction.

JMarc

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Abdelrazak Younes]

Jean-Marc Lasgouttes wrote:

lar...@gullik.org (Lars Gullik Bjønnes) writes:
  

Abdelrazak Younes you...@lyx.org writes:
| a bit like XML :-)

I clearly remember who helped shoot that one down.



Hmm, I feel a nice Friday thread brewing.
  


Usual suspects: me or André?

Abdel.

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[José Matos]

On Friday 06 March 2009 09:08:37 Guenter Milde wrote:
 I'd rather like to see the difference made clear.

 Layouts are block elements, you cannot have two layouts in one
 paragraph.

 Insets are  inline elements (even if they sometimes contain block
 elements.

No they are not. It is not possible to do this association one to one. Only 
char styles are exclusively inline elements.

It is difficult to argue that a float inset is an inline element. :-)

-- 
José Abílio

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Charles de Miramon]

Jean-Marc Lasgouttes wrote:

 rgheck rgh...@bobjweil.com writes:
 
 Jürgen Spitzmüller wrote:
 2. implement the possibility to add comments to the outliner items.
 As Helge wrote, these will need to be stored in the document (as
 specific properties). I suppose this would be much easier to
 implement after LyX's file format switched to XML, something that is
 planned for the immediate future, but still needs thought and
 action.

   
 I'd think this was fairly simple. Right now, you could do it like this
 in the document:
\begin_layout Section
\comment Here is the comment.
Section text as before.
 
 Why not special types of note insets? We want them in the document too.
 
 JMarc

If I understand the corkboard approach, you start by writing random notes,
an outline of your ideas, etc... Then you can shuffle it and link it and
then you start to write your document.

Wouldn't it make more sense to have a structure with a file note.xml a file
outline.xml the lyx file and a RDF database like they have for Nepomuk to
tag or link between elements.

Cheers,
Charles 
-- 
http://www.kde-france.org

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jean-Marc Lasgouttes]

Charles de Miramon cmira...@kde-france.org writes:
 If I understand the corkboard approach, you start by writing random notes,
 an outline of your ideas, etc... Then you can shuffle it and link it and
 then you start to write your document.

I'll have to read about it, then/

JMatc

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-06, José Matos wrote:
 On Friday 06 March 2009 09:08:37 Guenter Milde wrote:
 I'd rather like to see the difference made clear.

 Layouts are block elements, you cannot have two layouts in one
 paragraph.

 Insets are  inline elements (even if they sometimes contain block
 elements.

 No they are not. It is not possible to do this association one to one. Only 
 char styles are exclusively inline elements.

 It is difficult to argue that a float inset is an inline element. :-)

But it really is: 

 like a footnote, the float *definition* can be inside a
 paragraph while the *output* is moved to a different place by the tex
 engine.
 
You can even see the difference:

* when you put the float inset into its own paragraph, the following
  text is indented (or separated by vspace), as it starts a new paragraph.
  
OTOH, lists (like itemize) are by default nested inside surrounding
paragraph (in the LaTeX source) while separate paragraphs in LyX. 
You need to insert a --- Separator --- or another empty
paragraph to have the first paragraph after a list indented.


Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-06, Charles de Miramon wrote:

 If I understand the corkboard approach, you start by writing random notes,
 an outline of your ideas, etc... Then you can shuffle it and link it and
 then you start to write your document.

But this can already be done with Branches:

* Put your ideas in branch insets, so they are boxed.

* Copy and past them around.

* Use LyX' cross-referencing mechanism for linking.  

* Toggle inclusion of the content in the output.

* Move text parts to the main document with copy/kill/paste
  or just dissolve the box.
  

I agree that the interface could be made more user-friendly. 

* The need to set up branches under DocumentSettingsBranches before
  using them under InsertBranches might be part of the reason they are
  still widely unknown to the public.

* To get the corkboard feeling, it would be nice to be able to
  drag-and-drop the inset boxes around.

Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Eran Kaplinsky]

Ideally, the tool for organizing one's ideas before and during writing, 
would enable the user to choose between an outline mode and a mind map 
mode. Mind mapping tools such as xmind allow you to drag and drop your 
various topics/concepts in order to modify their order and hierarchy on 
the fly. Link the topics/concepts to blocks of text, and you have the 
perfect writer's tool.


Eran

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[José Matos]

On Friday 06 March 2009 13:57:34 Guenter Milde wrote:
 But it really is:

  like a footnote, the float definition can be inside a
  paragraph while the output is moved to a different place by the tex
  engine.
  
 You can even see the difference:

 * when you put the float inset into its own paragraph, the following
   text is indented (or separated by vspace), as it starts a new paragraph.

I would argue that this is a limitation/bug of latex. Really.

This would be moot if the paragraph had some kind of special markup, like:

\begin{standard}
...
\end{standard}

or even

\standard{...} if you prefer.

That would allow to leave space for new declarations outside of paragraphs, or 
for placing a float without affecting near paragraphs.

 OTOH, lists (like itemize) are by default nested inside surrounding
 paragraph (in the LaTeX source) while separate paragraphs in LyX.
 You need to insert a --- Separator --- or another empty
 paragraph to have the first paragraph after a list indented.


 Günter

-- 
José Abílio

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[lyx-devel]

This is exactly what I would like to implement.  Very similar to the way which 
Semantik (which was KDissert) works.  Once the data container is worked out, it 
should be relatively easy to implement additional views.  It is merely a visual 
representation of the same data.

My biggest questions of the moments are, where should this data live?  I also 
think that the other questions of, should the comments be included in the text? 
 I'm of two minds, I can certainly think of cases where it can be valuable.

Thoughts?

Cheers,

Rob Oakes

- Original Message -
From: Eran Kaplinsky eran.kaplin...@ualberta.ca
To: lyx-de...@oak-tree.us, lyx-devel@lists.lyx.org
Sent: Friday, March 6, 2009 11:32:44 AM GMT -07:00 US/Canada Mountain
Subject: Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

Ideally, the tool for organizing one's ideas before and during writing, 
would enable the user to choose between an outline mode and a mind map 
mode. Mind mapping tools such as xmind allow you to drag and drop your 
various topics/concepts in order to modify their order and hierarchy on 
the fly. Link the topics/concepts to blocks of text, and you have the 
perfect writer's tool.

Eran

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-06, José Matos wrote:
 On Friday 06 March 2009 13:57:34 Guenter Milde wrote:

  like a footnote, the float definition can be inside a
  paragraph while the output is moved to a different place by the tex
  engine.

 You can even see the difference:

 * when you put the float inset into its own paragraph, the following
   text is indented (or separated by vspace), as it starts a new paragraph.

 I would argue that this is a limitation/bug of latex. Really.

I don't see why this should be a bug/limitation.

 This would be moot if the paragraph had some kind of special markup, like:

 \begin{standard}
 ...
 \end{standard}

Nothing prevents you to define::

Style Standard
  LatexType Environment
  LatexName standard
  Preamble
\newenvironment{standard}{}{}
  EndPreamble
End

in order to get this behaviour. But I don't see any gain from this, as
the problem is rather that 

* pressing RETURN in LyX sometimes starts a new paragraph and sometimes
  not.

* the editor window does not always give a clear feedback when/where LyX
  will insert a blank line in the LaTeX source.
  
  
 That would allow to leave space for new declarations outside of
 paragraphs, or for placing a float without affecting near paragraphs.

Well, both float 1 and float 2 in the following example do not affect
near paragraphs:

  text 1
  \begin{float} float 1 \end{float}
  text 2

  \begin{float} float 2 \end{float}

  text 3

Possible problems in LyX are:

* with open insets, it might be hard to spot the difference in LyX

* with closed insets, the user might want to move the inset to a nice
  location (centered on its own line, say) and by this unknowingly breaks
  the containing paragraph.

Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[rgheck]

José Matos wrote:

On Friday 06 March 2009 13:57:34 Guenter Milde wrote:
  

But it really is:

 like a footnote, the float definition can be inside a
 paragraph while the output is moved to a different place by the tex
 engine.
 
You can even see the difference:


* when you put the float inset into its own paragraph, the following
  text is indented (or separated by vspace), as it starts a new paragraph.



I would argue that this is a limitation/bug of latex. Really.

This would be moot if the paragraph had some kind of special markup, like:

\begin{standard}
...
\end{standard}

or even

\standard{...} if you prefer.

That would allow to leave space for new declarations outside of paragraphs, or 
for placing a float without affecting near paragraphs.


  
I think this is all the more true of \section, which is really an 
environment, in the sense that it has a defined beginning AND END. I can 
well imagine a system under which sections, and other document 
divisions, were insets, and



OTOH, lists (like itemize) are by default nested inside surrounding
paragraph (in the LaTeX source) while separate paragraphs in LyX.
You need to insert a --- Separator --- or another empty
paragraph to have the first paragraph after a list indented.


the same is of course true of lists. Think of how this ought to be done 
in XML. (Yes, I know, h1. But I've got the same problem with h1.)


rh

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Lars Gullik Bjønnes]

Abdelrazak Younes  writes:

| a bit like XML :-)

I clearly remember who helped shoot that one down.

-- 
Lgb

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jean-Marc Lasgouttes]

lar...@gullik.org (Lars Gullik Bjønnes) writes:
> Abdelrazak Younes  writes:
> | a bit like XML :-)
>
> I clearly remember who helped shoot that one down.

Hmm, I feel a nice Friday thread brewing.

JMarc

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-06, Abdelrazak Younes wrote:
> Vincent van Ravesteijn wrote:
>> rgheck schreef:
>>> This is the same issue as with InsetOptArg. It shouldn't be an inset. 
>>> It's a layout feature.

>>> Richard

>> That's why I would like to see this difference to disappear. 

I'd rather like to see the difference made clear.

Layouts are "block elements", you cannot have two layouts in one
paragraph.

Insets are  "inline elements" (even if they sometimes contain block
elements.

>> Why is a note an Inset and the title an layout ? Why is a branch an
>> inset and the abstract a layout ? 

You can have a title in a note and a note in a title. But you cannot
have an abstract in a title or a title in an abstact.

>> Why do we have a lyxcode layout and a listings insets ? etc.

The listings inset should indeed preferabely be a layout (as the
lstlistings environment is a block element). 
  However, the inset has some additional features that might be needed
for listings...

Another example are "Container Environments" like slides of a
presentation. LyX' model for environment-type layouts not suited for
LaTeX environments that are wrappers around other styles.  The hack with
the "--- Separator ---" style is not needed if you use an Inset for these
environments instead.  The question is how I can obsolete a Style by an
Inset so that documents are updated to the new layout.

Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jean-Marc Lasgouttes]

Guenter Milde  writes:
> I'd rather like to see the difference made clear.
>
> Layouts are "block elements", you cannot have two layouts in one
> paragraph.
>
> Insets are  "inline elements" (even if they sometimes contain block
> elements.

Yes, and HTML shows well this distinction. However, I have failed
numerous times to explain the distinction.

JMarc

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Abdelrazak Younes]

Jean-Marc Lasgouttes wrote:

lar...@gullik.org (Lars Gullik Bjønnes) writes:
  

Abdelrazak Younes  writes:
| a bit like XML :-)

I clearly remember who helped shoot that one down.



Hmm, I feel a nice Friday thread brewing.
  


Usual suspects: me or André?

Abdel.

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[José Matos]

On Friday 06 March 2009 09:08:37 Guenter Milde wrote:
> I'd rather like to see the difference made clear.
>
> Layouts are "block elements", you cannot have two layouts in one
> paragraph.
>
> Insets are  "inline elements" (even if they sometimes contain block
> elements.

No they are not. It is not possible to do this association one to one. Only 
char styles are exclusively inline elements.

It is difficult to argue that a float inset is an inline element. :-)

-- 
José Abílio

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Charles de Miramon]

Jean-Marc Lasgouttes wrote:

> rgheck  writes:
> 
>> Jürgen Spitzmüller wrote:
>>> 2. implement the possibility to add comments to the outliner items.
>>> As Helge wrote, these will need to be stored in the document (as
>>> specific properties). I suppose this would be much easier to
>>> implement after LyX's file format switched to XML, something that is
>>> planned for the immediate future, but still needs thought and
>>> action.
>>>
>>>   
>> I'd think this was fairly simple. Right now, you could do it like this
>> in the document:
>>\begin_layout Section
>>\comment Here is the comment.
>>Section text as before.
> 
> Why not special types of note insets? We want them in the document too.
> 
> JMarc

If I understand the corkboard approach, you start by writing random notes,
an outline of your ideas, etc... Then you can shuffle it and link it and
then you start to write your document.

Wouldn't it make more sense to have a structure with a file note.xml a file
outline.xml the lyx file and a RDF database like they have for Nepomuk to
tag or link between elements.

Cheers,
Charles 
-- 
http://www.kde-france.org

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jean-Marc Lasgouttes]

Charles de Miramon  writes:
> If I understand the corkboard approach, you start by writing random notes,
> an outline of your ideas, etc... Then you can shuffle it and link it and
> then you start to write your document.

I'll have to read about it, then/

JMatc

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-06, José Matos wrote:
> On Friday 06 March 2009 09:08:37 Guenter Milde wrote:
>> I'd rather like to see the difference made clear.

>> Layouts are "block elements", you cannot have two layouts in one
>> paragraph.

>> Insets are  "inline elements" (even if they sometimes contain block
>> elements.

> No they are not. It is not possible to do this association one to one. Only 
> char styles are exclusively inline elements.

> It is difficult to argue that a float inset is an inline element. :-)

But it really is: 

 like a footnote, the float *definition* can be inside a
 paragraph while the *output* is moved to a different place by the tex
 engine.
 
You can even see the difference:

* when you put the float inset into its own paragraph, the following
  text is indented (or separated by vspace), as it starts a new paragraph.
  
OTOH, lists (like itemize) are by default nested inside surrounding
paragraph (in the LaTeX source) while separate paragraphs in LyX. 
You need to insert a "--- Separator ---" or another empty
paragraph to have the first paragraph after a list indented.


Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-06, Charles de Miramon wrote:

> If I understand the corkboard approach, you start by writing random notes,
> an outline of your ideas, etc... Then you can shuffle it and link it and
> then you start to write your document.

But this can already be done with Branches:

* Put your ideas in branch insets, so they are boxed.

* Copy and past them around.

* Use LyX' cross-referencing mechanism for linking.  

* Toggle inclusion of the content in the output.

* Move text parts to the main document with copy/kill/paste
  or just dissolve the box.
  

I agree that the interface could be made more user-friendly. 

* The need to set up branches under Document>Settings>Branches before
  using them under Insert>Branches might be part of the reason they are
  still widely unknown to the public.

* To get the "corkboard" feeling, it would be nice to be able to
  drag-and-drop the inset boxes around.

Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Eran Kaplinsky]

Ideally, the tool for organizing one's ideas before and during writing, 
would enable the user to choose between an outline mode and a mind map 
mode. Mind mapping tools such as xmind allow you to drag and drop your 
various topics/concepts in order to modify their order and hierarchy on 
the fly. Link the topics/concepts to blocks of text, and you have the 
perfect writer's tool.


Eran

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[José Matos]

On Friday 06 March 2009 13:57:34 Guenter Milde wrote:
> But it really is:
>
>  like a footnote, the float definition can be inside a
>  paragraph while the output is moved to a different place by the tex
>  engine.
>  
> You can even see the difference:
>
> * when you put the float inset into its own paragraph, the following
>   text is indented (or separated by vspace), as it starts a new paragraph.

I would argue that this is a limitation/bug of latex. Really.

This would be moot if the paragraph had some kind of special markup, like:

\begin{standard}
...
\end{standard}

or even

\standard{...} if you prefer.

That would allow to leave space for new declarations outside of paragraphs, or 
for placing a float without affecting near paragraphs.

> OTOH, lists (like itemize) are by default nested inside surrounding
> paragraph (in the LaTeX source) while separate paragraphs in LyX.
> You need to insert a "--- Separator ---" or another empty
> paragraph to have the first paragraph after a list indented.
>
>
> Günter

-- 
José Abílio

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[lyx-devel]

This is exactly what I would like to implement.  Very similar to the way which 
Semantik (which was KDissert) works.  Once the data container is worked out, it 
should be relatively easy to implement additional views.  It is merely a visual 
representation of the same data.

My biggest questions of the moments are, where should this data live?  I also 
think that the other questions of, should the comments be included in the text? 
 I'm of two minds, I can certainly think of cases where it can be valuable.

Thoughts?

Cheers,

Rob Oakes

- Original Message -
From: "Eran Kaplinsky" <eran.kaplin...@ualberta.ca>
To: lyx-de...@oak-tree.us, lyx-devel@lists.lyx.org
Sent: Friday, March 6, 2009 11:32:44 AM GMT -07:00 US/Canada Mountain
Subject: Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

Ideally, the tool for organizing one's ideas before and during writing, 
would enable the user to choose between an outline mode and a mind map 
mode. Mind mapping tools such as xmind allow you to drag and drop your 
various topics/concepts in order to modify their order and hierarchy on 
the fly. Link the topics/concepts to blocks of text, and you have the 
perfect writer's tool.

Eran

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-06, José Matos wrote:
> On Friday 06 March 2009 13:57:34 Guenter Milde wrote:

>>  like a footnote, the float definition can be inside a
>>  paragraph while the output is moved to a different place by the tex
>>  engine.

>> You can even see the difference:

>> * when you put the float inset into its own paragraph, the following
>>   text is indented (or separated by vspace), as it starts a new paragraph.

> I would argue that this is a limitation/bug of latex. Really.

I don't see why this should be a bug/limitation.

> This would be moot if the paragraph had some kind of special markup, like:

> \begin{standard}
> ...
> \end{standard}

Nothing prevents you to define::

Style Standard
  LatexType Environment
  LatexName standard
  Preamble
\newenvironment{standard}{}{}
  EndPreamble
End

in order to get this behaviour. But I don't see any gain from this, as
the problem is rather that 

* pressing RETURN in LyX sometimes starts a new paragraph and sometimes
  not.

* the editor window does not always give a clear feedback when/where LyX
  will insert a blank line in the LaTeX source.
  
  
> That would allow to leave space for new declarations outside of
> paragraphs, or for placing a float without affecting near paragraphs.

Well, both float 1 and float 2 in the following example do not affect
near paragraphs:

  text 1
  \begin{float} float 1 \end{float}
  text 2

  \begin{float} float 2 \end{float}

  text 3

Possible problems in LyX are:

* with open insets, it might be hard to spot the difference in LyX

* with closed insets, the user might want to move the inset to a "nice"
  location (centered on its own line, say) and by this unknowingly breaks
  the containing paragraph.

Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[rgheck]

José Matos wrote:

On Friday 06 March 2009 13:57:34 Guenter Milde wrote:
  

But it really is:

 like a footnote, the float definition can be inside a
 paragraph while the output is moved to a different place by the tex
 engine.
 
You can even see the difference:


* when you put the float inset into its own paragraph, the following
  text is indented (or separated by vspace), as it starts a new paragraph.



I would argue that this is a limitation/bug of latex. Really.

This would be moot if the paragraph had some kind of special markup, like:

\begin{standard}
...
\end{standard}

or even

\standard{...} if you prefer.

That would allow to leave space for new declarations outside of paragraphs, or 
for placing a float without affecting near paragraphs.


  
I think this is all the more true of \section, which is really an 
environment, in the sense that it has a defined beginning AND END. I can 
well imagine a system under which sections, and other document 
divisions, were insets, and



OTOH, lists (like itemize) are by default nested inside surrounding
paragraph (in the LaTeX source) while separate paragraphs in LyX.
You need to insert a "--- Separator ---" or another empty
paragraph to have the first paragraph after a list indented.


the same is of course true of lists. Think of how this ought to be done 
in XML. (Yes, I know, . But I've got the same problem with .)


rh

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Helge Hafting]

Rob Oakes wrote:

Dear Jürgen and other LyX Developers,

Thank you very much for the kind welcome.  Pursuant to your advice, I have 
gone through and tried to develop my thoughts on a few features that I would 
be excited to develop and add to LyX.  Because of dummy-layouts and a few 
other graphics I wasn't able to send it via e-mail. However, you can find 
the full proposal at:


http://www.oak-tree.us/blog/index.php/2009/03/04/perfect-tool

or a PDF version at:

http://www.oak-tree.us/stuff/LyX-Proposal.pdf


Interesting.

Here's a quick summary: LyX is one of the easiest and best ways to leverage 
the power of LaTeX.  Unfortunately, most of its features are geared document 
preparation.  It would be wonderful if LyX included a robust outliner or 
more visual way to interact with the structure of the document (though the 
outline view in the 1.6 series is an excellent start).  Scrivener, a program 
for Mac OS X (http://www.literatureandlatte.com) and Semantik 
(http://www.freehackers.org/~tnagy/kdissert.html) includes such tools.


The most important features of the expanded outline system would be:

1.) Easy rearrangement (drag and drop) of outline items.

Shouldn't be too hard to add. Movement of items is supported, all you
need is user-friendly dragging.

2.) Inclusion of a summary field (which is not part of the document text) 
and allows for graphical manipulation of the document.
While not part of the document, I think it ought to be stored in the 
document file. Similiar to note insets.



3.) Ties between the outline items and blocks of text in the draft.
The current outliner is perfectly tied because it is the document text 
you see. The outliner is not stored in the document or anywhere else, it 
 is displayed directly from document data. The obvious advantage is 
that it cannot possibly get out of sync with the document - there 
being nothing to keep up to date.


Your summary field would have to be tied in somehow. I think it should 
be stored as an attribute of whatever section/chapter/part it belongs 
to. That way, all the existing ways of moving stuff around (including 
such things as cutpaste of whole chapters) will work for summary stuff 
too. Of course the summary don't have to show in the main window, it can 
be a outline-only thing.


4.) Outline data would remain as part of the original LyX document, it would 
not be exported into other document types (LaTeX, HTML, etc.)


While none of these ideas are original, my thinking has congealed increasing 
frustrated with the aforementioned Scrivener.  While its creative tools are 
wonderful, the word processor is too underpowered to be of much practical 
use.  Without a fully featured word processor, the outliner and corkboard 
are just nifty gimmicks.


Yet, they are extremely useful gimmicks.  As someone who spends more than 
50% of his productive hours writing grants, papers, or proposals; I can say 
that a robust outliner and visual system for interacting with the structure 
of complex documents would greatly simplify many of my daily routine.  I was 
able to get a rather substantial outline for a book completed in Scrivener, 
before needing to move it to LyX.  I would have greatly preferred to work 
exclusively from LyX.


Does anyone have additional thoughts or ideas how the technical 
implementation might look?  Are there currently plans to implement such a 
system?  Have similar features been discussed and dismissed in the past as 
being unrealistic or impractical?


Nothing has been dismissed; the existing outliner is popular, and 
further improvements are possible. The biggest problem is probably that 
someone has to do the job.


Helge Hafting

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jürgen Spitzmüller]

Rob Oakes wrote:
 http://www.oak-tree.us/stuff/LyX-Proposal.pdf

Thanks, this is a an interesting paper. I think that your proposal is 
overall compatible with LyX's approach, and I think LyX could be extended to 
support at least many of your ideas.

The actual question now is: how to implement that. As said, it should be 
done in small steps, and the implementation has to be in line with LyX's 
existing code and concepts.

As I see it, you could proceed as follows:

1. implement drag and drop support in the outliner. This is a long-standing 
feature request anyway (only nobody volunteered until now).

2. implement the possibility to add comments to the outliner items. As Helge 
wrote, these will need to be stored in the document (as specific 
properties). I suppose this would be much easier to implement after LyX's 
file format switched to XML, something that is planned for the immediate 
future, but still needs thought and action.

3. implement representations of the outliner comments. I'm not quite sure 
about the Corkboard concept, but the other representation would be 
certainly doable (and easier), so you should probably start with this 
representation.

So: go ahead and propose patches :-)

Jürgen

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[rgheck]

Jürgen Spitzmüller wrote:
2. implement the possibility to add comments to the outliner items. As Helge 
wrote, these will need to be stored in the document (as specific 
properties). I suppose this would be much easier to implement after LyX's 
file format switched to XML, something that is planned for the immediate 
future, but still needs thought and action.


  
I'd think this was fairly simple. Right now, you could do it like this 
in the document:

   \begin_layout Section
   \comment Here is the comment.
   Section text as before.
Editing such things could be done via a simple dialog popped from a 
context menu, both in the main text and in the outliner. What's not so 
clear is where this goes in the internal representation of the document. 
As a paragraph parameter? This seems like yet another reason to want 
paragraph groups.


rh

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jean-Marc Lasgouttes]

rgheck rgh...@bobjweil.com writes:

 Jürgen Spitzmüller wrote:
 2. implement the possibility to add comments to the outliner items.
 As Helge wrote, these will need to be stored in the document (as
 specific properties). I suppose this would be much easier to
 implement after LyX's file format switched to XML, something that is
 planned for the immediate future, but still needs thought and
 action.

   
 I'd think this was fairly simple. Right now, you could do it like this
 in the document:
\begin_layout Section
\comment Here is the comment.
Section text as before.

Why not special types of note insets? We want them in the document too.

JMarc

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[rgheck]

Jean-Marc Lasgouttes wrote:

rgheck rgh...@bobjweil.com writes:

  

Jürgen Spitzmüller wrote:


2. implement the possibility to add comments to the outliner items.
As Helge wrote, these will need to be stored in the document (as
specific properties). I suppose this would be much easier to
implement after LyX's file format switched to XML, something that is
planned for the immediate future, but still needs thought and
action.

  
  

I'd think this was fairly simple. Right now, you could do it like this
in the document:
   \begin_layout Section
   \comment Here is the comment.
   Section text as before.



Why not special types of note insets? We want them in the document too.

  
You could do that, but the problem with that kind of solution, as I see 
it, is that you then have to keep the note insets in the right place. 
This is the same issue as with InsetOptArg. It shouldn't be an inset. 
It's a layout feature. And because it's an inset, you have to make sure 
it doesn't get moved to the end of the sentence, and it gets handled 
properly if the layout gets changed, etc. All of which is really 
artificial and therefore prone to error. I'd much rather InsetOptArg 
worked the same way.


As for displaying them in the document, how and whether they get drawn 
is presumably independent of their representation. I was thinking they 
would NOT be shown in the document but rather in some dialog, but they 
can be shown if we wish.


Richard

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jean-Marc Lasgouttes]

rgheck rgh...@bobjweil.com writes:
 You could do that, but the problem with that kind of solution, as I
 see it, is that you then have to keep the note insets in the right
 place. This is the same issue as with InsetOptArg. It shouldn't be an
 inset. It's a layout feature. 

But it is a _note_. And if it makes sense in outline, it will make sense
in text. We can just show the contents of notes that are in the section
paragraphs. Or have a 'show in outline' option if you prefer.

 And because it's an inset, you have to make sure it doesn't get moved
 to the end of the sentence, and it gets handled properly if the layout
 gets changed, etc. All of which is really artificial and therefore
 prone to error. I'd much rather InsetOptArg worked the same way.

But a note is a note. It is not the same case as InetOptArg. And with a
proper inset, the contents can be much much richer (maths...)

JMarc

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Vincent van Ravesteijn]

rgheck schreef:
This is the same issue as with InsetOptArg. It shouldn't be an inset. 
It's a layout feature.


Richard

That's why I would like to see this difference to disappear. Why is a 
note an Inset and the title an layout ? Why is a branch an inset and the 
abstract a layout ? Why do we have a lyxcode layout and a listings 
insets ? etc.  Well, I maybe could answer myself here, but the 
difference is little. And now we want to have layouts with features and 
settings and insets that look like layouts (e.g. also charstyles etc.).


PS. I do not want to start a everything-is-an-inset flamewar...

Vincent

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-05, Jean-Marc Lasgouttes wrote:

We can just show the contents of notes that are in the section
 paragraphs. 

This is what I had in mind too.

 Or have a 'show in outline' option if you prefer.

I'd prefer a show summary/notes toggle in the outliner instead.

Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Abdelrazak Younes]

Guenter Milde wrote:

On 2009-03-05, Jean-Marc Lasgouttes wrote:

  

We can just show the contents of notes that are in the section
paragraphs. 



This is what I had in mind too.

  

Or have a 'show in outline' option if you prefer.



I'd prefer a show summary/notes toggle in the outliner instead.
  


If a note is in the section title or in the caption, or just next to it, 
we could automatically show them in a tooltip of the outline item for 
example. Or we could split the dockwidget vertically in order to show 
the note of the currently selected item via a toggle, as you suggest.


Abdel.

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Abdelrazak Younes]

Vincent van Ravesteijn wrote:

rgheck schreef:
This is the same issue as with InsetOptArg. It shouldn't be an inset. 
It's a layout feature.


Richard

That's why I would like to see this difference to disappear. Why is a 
note an Inset and the title an layout ? Why is a branch an inset and 
the abstract a layout ? Why do we have a lyxcode layout and a listings 
insets ? etc.  Well, I maybe could answer myself here, but the 
difference is little. And now we want to have layouts with features 
and settings and insets that look like layouts (e.g. also charstyles 
etc.).


Once we have insets that can look like layouts, everything can switch to 
an inset, even paragraph. But that has been a vaporware idea for many 
years, a bit like XML :-)




PS. I do not want to start a everything-is-an-inset flamewar...


That's exactly what you are doing...

Abdel.

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Helge Hafting]

Rob Oakes wrote:

Dear Jürgen and other LyX Developers,

Thank you very much for the kind welcome.  Pursuant to your advice, I have 
gone through and tried to develop my thoughts on a few features that I would 
be excited to develop and add to LyX.  Because of dummy-layouts and a few 
other graphics I wasn't able to send it via e-mail. However, you can find 
the full proposal at:


http://www.oak-tree.us/blog/index.php/2009/03/04/perfect-tool

or a PDF version at:

http://www.oak-tree.us/stuff/LyX-Proposal.pdf


Interesting.

Here's a quick summary: LyX is one of the easiest and best ways to leverage 
the power of LaTeX.  Unfortunately, most of its features are geared document 
preparation.  It would be wonderful if LyX included a robust outliner or 
more visual way to interact with the structure of the document (though the 
outline view in the 1.6 series is an excellent start).  Scrivener, a program 
for Mac OS X (http://www.literatureandlatte.com) and Semantik 
(http://www.freehackers.org/~tnagy/kdissert.html) includes such tools.


The most important features of the expanded outline system would be:

1.) Easy rearrangement (drag and drop) of outline items.

Shouldn't be too hard to add. Movement of items is supported, all you
need is user-friendly dragging.

2.) Inclusion of a summary field (which is not part of the document text) 
and allows for graphical manipulation of the document.
While not part of the document, I think it ought to be stored in the 
document file. Similiar to note insets.



3.) Ties between the outline items and blocks of text in the draft.
The current outliner is perfectly tied because it is the document text 
you see. The outliner is not stored in the document or anywhere else, it 
 is displayed directly from document data. The obvious advantage is 
that it cannot possibly get "out of sync" with the document - there 
being nothing to "keep up to date".


Your summary field would have to be tied in somehow. I think it should 
be stored as an attribute of whatever section/chapter/part it belongs 
to. That way, all the existing ways of moving stuff around (including 
such things as cut of whole chapters) will work for summary stuff 
too. Of course the summary don't have to show in the main window, it can 
be a outline-only thing.


4.) Outline data would remain as part of the original LyX document, it would 
not be exported into other document types (LaTeX, HTML, etc.)


While none of these ideas are original, my thinking has congealed increasing 
frustrated with the aforementioned Scrivener.  While its creative tools are 
wonderful, the word processor is too underpowered to be of much practical 
use.  Without a fully featured word processor, the outliner and corkboard 
are just nifty gimmicks.


Yet, they are extremely useful gimmicks.  As someone who spends more than 
50% of his productive hours writing grants, papers, or proposals; I can say 
that a robust outliner and visual system for interacting with the structure 
of complex documents would greatly simplify many of my daily routine.  I was 
able to get a rather substantial outline for a book completed in Scrivener, 
before needing to move it to LyX.  I would have greatly preferred to work 
exclusively from LyX.


Does anyone have additional thoughts or ideas how the technical 
implementation might look?  Are there currently plans to implement such a 
system?  Have similar features been discussed and dismissed in the past as 
being unrealistic or impractical?


Nothing has been dismissed; the existing outliner is popular, and 
further improvements are possible. The biggest problem is probably that 
someone has to do the job.


Helge Hafting

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jürgen Spitzmüller]

Rob Oakes wrote:
> http://www.oak-tree.us/stuff/LyX-Proposal.pdf

Thanks, this is a an interesting paper. I think that your proposal is 
overall compatible with LyX's approach, and I think LyX could be extended to 
support at least many of your ideas.

The actual question now is: how to implement that. As said, it should be 
done in small steps, and the implementation has to be in line with LyX's 
existing code and concepts.

As I see it, you could proceed as follows:

1. implement drag and drop support in the outliner. This is a long-standing 
feature request anyway (only nobody volunteered until now).

2. implement the possibility to add comments to the outliner items. As Helge 
wrote, these will need to be stored in the document (as specific 
properties). I suppose this would be much easier to implement after LyX's 
file format switched to XML, something that is planned for the immediate 
future, but still needs thought and action.

3. implement representations of the outliner comments. I'm not quite sure 
about the "Corkboard" concept, but the other representation would be 
certainly doable (and easier), so you should probably start with this 
representation.

So: go ahead and propose patches :-)

Jürgen

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[rgheck]

Jürgen Spitzmüller wrote:
2. implement the possibility to add comments to the outliner items. As Helge 
wrote, these will need to be stored in the document (as specific 
properties). I suppose this would be much easier to implement after LyX's 
file format switched to XML, something that is planned for the immediate 
future, but still needs thought and action.


  
I'd think this was fairly simple. Right now, you could do it like this 
in the document:

   \begin_layout Section
   \comment Here is the comment.
   Section text as before.
Editing such things could be done via a simple dialog popped from a 
context menu, both in the main text and in the outliner. What's not so 
clear is where this goes in the internal representation of the document. 
As a paragraph parameter? This seems like yet another reason to want 
paragraph groups.


rh

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jean-Marc Lasgouttes]

rgheck  writes:

> Jürgen Spitzmüller wrote:
>> 2. implement the possibility to add comments to the outliner items.
>> As Helge wrote, these will need to be stored in the document (as
>> specific properties). I suppose this would be much easier to
>> implement after LyX's file format switched to XML, something that is
>> planned for the immediate future, but still needs thought and
>> action.
>>
>>   
> I'd think this was fairly simple. Right now, you could do it like this
> in the document:
>\begin_layout Section
>\comment Here is the comment.
>Section text as before.

Why not special types of note insets? We want them in the document too.

JMarc

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[rgheck]

Jean-Marc Lasgouttes wrote:

rgheck  writes:

  

Jürgen Spitzmüller wrote:


2. implement the possibility to add comments to the outliner items.
As Helge wrote, these will need to be stored in the document (as
specific properties). I suppose this would be much easier to
implement after LyX's file format switched to XML, something that is
planned for the immediate future, but still needs thought and
action.

  
  

I'd think this was fairly simple. Right now, you could do it like this
in the document:
   \begin_layout Section
   \comment Here is the comment.
   Section text as before.



Why not special types of note insets? We want them in the document too.

  
You could do that, but the problem with that kind of solution, as I see 
it, is that you then have to keep the note insets in the right place. 
This is the same issue as with InsetOptArg. It shouldn't be an inset. 
It's a layout feature. And because it's an inset, you have to make sure 
it doesn't get moved to the end of the sentence, and it gets handled 
properly if the layout gets changed, etc. All of which is really 
artificial and therefore prone to error. I'd much rather InsetOptArg 
worked the same way.


As for displaying them in the document, how and whether they get drawn 
is presumably independent of their representation. I was thinking they 
would NOT be shown in the document but rather in some dialog, but they 
can be shown if we wish.


Richard

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Jean-Marc Lasgouttes]

rgheck  writes:
> You could do that, but the problem with that kind of solution, as I
> see it, is that you then have to keep the note insets in the right
> place. This is the same issue as with InsetOptArg. It shouldn't be an
> inset. It's a layout feature. 

But it is a _note_. And if it makes sense in outline, it will make sense
in text. We can just show the contents of notes that are in the section
paragraphs. Or have a 'show in outline' option if you prefer.

> And because it's an inset, you have to make sure it doesn't get moved
> to the end of the sentence, and it gets handled properly if the layout
> gets changed, etc. All of which is really artificial and therefore
> prone to error. I'd much rather InsetOptArg worked the same way.

But a note is a note. It is not the same case as InetOptArg. And with a
proper inset, the contents can be much much richer (maths...)

JMarc

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Vincent van Ravesteijn]

rgheck schreef:
This is the same issue as with InsetOptArg. It shouldn't be an inset. 
It's a layout feature.


Richard

That's why I would like to see this difference to disappear. Why is a 
note an Inset and the title an layout ? Why is a branch an inset and the 
abstract a layout ? Why do we have a lyxcode layout and a listings 
insets ? etc.  Well, I maybe could answer myself here, but the 
difference is little. And now we want to have layouts with features and 
settings and insets that look like layouts (e.g. also charstyles etc.).


PS. I do not want to start a "everything-is-an-inset flamewar"...

Vincent

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Guenter Milde]

On 2009-03-05, Jean-Marc Lasgouttes wrote:

>We can just show the contents of notes that are in the section
> paragraphs. 

This is what I had in mind too.

> Or have a 'show in outline' option if you prefer.

I'd prefer a "show summary/notes" toggle in the outliner instead.

Günter

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Abdelrazak Younes]

Guenter Milde wrote:

On 2009-03-05, Jean-Marc Lasgouttes wrote:

  

We can just show the contents of notes that are in the section
paragraphs. 



This is what I had in mind too.

  

Or have a 'show in outline' option if you prefer.



I'd prefer a "show summary/notes" toggle in the outliner instead.
  


If a note is in the section title or in the caption, or just next to it, 
we could automatically show them in a tooltip of the outline item for 
example. Or we could split the dockwidget vertically in order to show 
the note of the currently selected item via a toggle, as you suggest.


Abdel.

Re: LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Abdelrazak Younes]

Vincent van Ravesteijn wrote:

rgheck schreef:
This is the same issue as with InsetOptArg. It shouldn't be an inset. 
It's a layout feature.


Richard

That's why I would like to see this difference to disappear. Why is a 
note an Inset and the title an layout ? Why is a branch an inset and 
the abstract a layout ? Why do we have a lyxcode layout and a listings 
insets ? etc.  Well, I maybe could answer myself here, but the 
difference is little. And now we want to have layouts with features 
and settings and insets that look like layouts (e.g. also charstyles 
etc.).


Once we have insets that can look like layouts, everything can switch to 
an inset, even paragraph. But that has been a vaporware idea for many 
years, a bit like XML :-)




PS. I do not want to start a "everything-is-an-inset flamewar"...


That's exactly what you are doing...

Abdel.

LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Rob Oakes]

Dear Jürgen and other LyX Developers,

Thank you very much for the kind welcome.  Pursuant to your advice, I have 
gone through and tried to develop my thoughts on a few features that I would 
be excited to develop and add to LyX.  Because of dummy-layouts and a few 
other graphics I wasn't able to send it via e-mail. However, you can find 
the full proposal at:

http://www.oak-tree.us/blog/index.php/2009/03/04/perfect-tool

or a PDF version at:

http://www.oak-tree.us/stuff/LyX-Proposal.pdf

Here's a quick summary: LyX is one of the easiest and best ways to leverage 
the power of LaTeX.  Unfortunately, most of its features are geared document 
preparation.  It would be wonderful if LyX included a robust outliner or 
more visual way to interact with the structure of the document (though the 
outline view in the 1.6 series is an excellent start).  Scrivener, a program 
for Mac OS X (http://www.literatureandlatte.com) and Semantik 
(http://www.freehackers.org/~tnagy/kdissert.html) includes such tools.

The most important features of the expanded outline system would be:

1.) Easy rearrangement (drag and drop) of outline items.
2.) Inclusion of a summary field (which is not part of the document text) 
and allows for graphical manipulation of the document.
3.) Ties between the outline items and blocks of text in the draft.
4.) Outline data would remain as part of the original LyX document, it would 
not be exported into other document types (LaTeX, HTML, etc.)

While none of these ideas are original, my thinking has congealed increasing 
frustrated with the aforementioned Scrivener.  While its creative tools are 
wonderful, the word processor is too underpowered to be of much practical 
use.  Without a fully featured word processor, the outliner and corkboard 
are just nifty gimmicks.

Yet, they are extremely useful gimmicks.  As someone who spends more than 
50% of his productive hours writing grants, papers, or proposals; I can say 
that a robust outliner and visual system for interacting with the structure 
of complex documents would greatly simplify many of my daily routine.  I was 
able to get a rather substantial outline for a book completed in Scrivener, 
before needing to move it to LyX.  I would have greatly preferred to work 
exclusively from LyX.

Does anyone have additional thoughts or ideas how the technical 
implementation might look?  Are there currently plans to implement such a 
system?  Have similar features been discussed and dismissed in the past as 
being unrealistic or impractical?

Cheers,

Rob Oakes

LyX Outliner and Corkboard - Feature Proposal

[Rob Oakes]

Dear Jürgen and other LyX Developers,

Thank you very much for the kind welcome.  Pursuant to your advice, I have 
gone through and tried to develop my thoughts on a few features that I would 
be excited to develop and add to LyX.  Because of dummy-layouts and a few 
other graphics I wasn't able to send it via e-mail. However, you can find 
the full proposal at:

http://www.oak-tree.us/blog/index.php/2009/03/04/perfect-tool

or a PDF version at:

http://www.oak-tree.us/stuff/LyX-Proposal.pdf

Here's a quick summary: LyX is one of the easiest and best ways to leverage 
the power of LaTeX.  Unfortunately, most of its features are geared document 
preparation.  It would be wonderful if LyX included a robust outliner or 
more visual way to interact with the structure of the document (though the 
outline view in the 1.6 series is an excellent start).  Scrivener, a program 
for Mac OS X (http://www.literatureandlatte.com) and Semantik 
(http://www.freehackers.org/~tnagy/kdissert.html) includes such tools.

The most important features of the expanded outline system would be:

1.) Easy rearrangement (drag and drop) of outline items.
2.) Inclusion of a summary field (which is not part of the document text) 
and allows for graphical manipulation of the document.
3.) Ties between the outline items and blocks of text in the draft.
4.) Outline data would remain as part of the original LyX document, it would 
not be exported into other document types (LaTeX, HTML, etc.)

While none of these ideas are original, my thinking has congealed increasing 
frustrated with the aforementioned Scrivener.  While its creative tools are 
wonderful, the word processor is too underpowered to be of much practical 
use.  Without a fully featured word processor, the outliner and corkboard 
are just nifty gimmicks.

Yet, they are extremely useful gimmicks.  As someone who spends more than 
50% of his productive hours writing grants, papers, or proposals; I can say 
that a robust outliner and visual system for interacting with the structure 
of complex documents would greatly simplify many of my daily routine.  I was 
able to get a rather substantial outline for a book completed in Scrivener, 
before needing to move it to LyX.  I would have greatly preferred to work 
exclusively from LyX.

Does anyone have additional thoughts or ideas how the technical 
implementation might look?  Are there currently plans to implement such a 
system?  Have similar features been discussed and dismissed in the past as 
being unrealistic or impractical?

Cheers,

Rob Oakes