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The LaTeX Fetish (2016)

danielallington.net

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Re: The LaTeX Fetish (2016)

#131

Post by NoGravitas »

Derbasti wrote: post #62
taeric wrote: post #12

I had a few things about TeX versus LaTeX. I think the reality is nobody really tries writing TeX. But, ultimately my beef is the straw man that markup is bad because it is harder to read. That a graphical editor is superior because it is more readable. Instead, the advantage is that in the one you are only writing text and you are indicating special instructions to the computer. In the other, you only see what the c…

Also, he implies that LaTeX documents are always typeset in Computer Modern and the plain article template (which is ugly!). XeTeX can use all the same TTF/OTF fonts Word uses. Oh, and let's not forget that Word's math renderer is gross.

I dislike that the author called using a font other than CM "advanced". Since the mid-90s, it's been just \usepackage{fontname} in the header to change the set of base fonts to some other combination that looks good together.

Yes, you need to learn to do that, but it's nothing compared to all the boilerplate you need to get a basic LaTeX document working.

Re: The LaTeX Fetish (2016)

#132

Post by anc84 »

Derbasti wrote: post #117
TrickyRick wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.chachatelier.fr/latexit/ is a solution to that. Write your math in Latex > export as image. I always use that whenever I have to display math in something which doesn't support Latex.

Can Word import PDF? How would I keep editable copies of the Math code? I use a similar workflow for PowerPoint slides, where I have dozens of files with a minimal LaTeX template that render math fragments to tiny PDF files, which I can then include in the PowerPoint slides. It's a huge pain. (But less painful than LaTeX beamer).

SVG or MathML are supported by Word and available as export from this tool.

There are several online tools to do this as well: https://viereck.ch/latex-to-svg/ , www.tlhiv.org/ltxpreview/ , http://www.codecogs.com/latex/eqneditor.php

Re: The LaTeX Fetish (2016)

#133

Post by prance »

jhanschoo wrote: post #3

The author misses one very important feature of LaTeX that is the reason why I keep a lot of my notes in it. LaTeX exposes two mechanisms for easily making replacements all across a document. One is with macros, which you can change the definition of when necessary. The other is the simple search-and-replace, which is very powerful since you can involve macro and formatting syntax in it. Traditional word-processing a…

> One is with macros, which you can change the definition of when necessary.

I concur on this. In my phd thesis, I defined macros for all frequently used mathematical terms and expressions. This way, many places got almost as readable as the rendered formula.

For example, "\tfuzzy(1,2,3)", denoting a triangular fuzzy number with min. support 1, modal value 2 and max. support 3, is pretty clear after using it once or twice. We can then decide later how exactly to render it by changing the macro definition.

Similarly, when citing a lot of names (just using the names here, not actually paper references) wich characters which are not in my commonly used alphabet, I frequently define macros for them too. Then I can use e.g. "\Mares" in the text instead of "Mare{\v{s}}". Much easier, also when compared to hunting those special chars in a character map in a WYSIWYG word processor, or copy-pasting all the time.

However, I find this use of macros really only really pays off when working on larger documents, or living documents that keep changing, like CVs. For shorter and short-lived docs, I'd use Latex only if they have at least some math or special layouting requirements. I tried using Word's formula editor, but even though one can sort of get used to it, I find Latex much easier to use, especially with amstex. But for shorter documents without math, I find a word processor just much more convenient.

Re: The LaTeX Fetish (2016)

#134

Post by anc84 »

majewsky wrote: post #114

I disagree with the premise. A few years ago, my brothers were simultaneously writng their Masters theses (in civil engineering, where LaTeX is not exactly common). One of them decided to plunge into LaTeX. It took him a week or so to get productive, but once everything was set up, it "just worked" and he could focus on his thesis. The other one decided to stick to the conventional choice, Microsoft Word. He started…

When the deadline neared, [I] descended into near-madness trying to get LaTeX put the correct page numbers where I wanted them, don't have empty blocks of whitespace in arbitrary places and actually render citations as it did all the weeks before.

Re: The LaTeX Fetish (2016)

#135

Post by dmitriid »

jcelerier wrote: post #108
dmitriid wrote: post #103

LaTeX is only good for one thing, and one thing only: create same-looking two-column PDFs for research/scholarly publications. And it's barely good at that. Things may have changed slightly since I last used it (cca 2008), but: combining several languages in one document (Turkish + Russian, anyone?), tables that properly span several pages, inline images, a different layout (that doesn't break languages, or tables, o…

> combining several languages in one document (Turkish + Russian what's the problem with this ? just encode as UTF-8 and type however you like.

"Things may have changed slightly since I last used it " :)

It's a good thing it finally got to understand Unicode. It was a pain previously

Re: The LaTeX Fetish (2016)

#136

Post by dmitriid »

claudius wrote: post #128
jabl wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The hyphenation algorithm, I guess, needs some knowledge of the language. Probably a lot more issues as well.

Currently works perfectly for me with English and German where I place \selectlanguage{UKenglish} and \selectlanguage{ngerman} in front of the appropriate paragraphs. Hyphenation then simply works.

> Currently works perfectly for me with English and German

Both fit neatly into the same codepage, latin-1, so no possible conflicts there

> I place \selectlanguage{UKenglish} and \selectlanguage{ngerman} in front of the appropriate paragraphs

What about mixing two languages within the same paragraph? \selectlanguage before and after each word?

Re: The LaTeX Fetish (2016)

#137

Post by LeifCarrotson »

peterburkimsher wrote: post #89
moomin wrote: post #71

So, to demonstrate how bad LaTeX is, he picks the single most markup heavy thing you do (barring tables) and compares it to plain text? Plain text, I'll point out, that doesn't format the same way. In practice, there _are_ a bunch of extra steps to get this working in Word, they're just not easy to express in a text document. Then he goes on to show the example of trying to find a spelling error. Ignoring that this j…

> work with multiple people or track the history of a document I often proofread for my friends. I tell them that they must use Track Changes in Word. Is there a better tool that you recommend?

Google Docs supports multiple simultaneous editors and tracks revision histories. It was a lifesaver for group projects in college.

And while 'always online' is often a bad thing, it seems to be a lot more reliable than the alternatives of email chains with the attached Word document, appending -R3-edited-complete-final-done.docx to the filename, the manual merges when two people are working on the same thing, or the USB stick that gets passed around.

Re: The LaTeX Fetish (2016)

#138

Post by eesmith »

majewsky wrote: post #113
eesmith wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He does not imply they are "always typeset in Computer Modern". The relevant quote is "everything is (typically) printed in this weird, old-fashioned-looking typeface called Computer Modern." The "(typically)" implies that there are cases where the result is not in Computer Modern. On the same topic, "if you want to do anything really wild and crazy – like using a typeface other than Computer Modern – then plain vani…

> The relevant quote is "everything is (typically) printed in this weird, old-fashioned-looking typeface called Computer Modern." The "(typically)" implies that there are cases where the result is not in Computer Modern. In school, I was told that you should only put stuff in parentheses that is not strictly required to understand the statement. Without them, we're left with "Everything is printed in [...] Computer M…

Your own use of parenthetical comments shows that you don't follow that rule. Quoting you at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14949375 :

"A typical megacorporation is just as centralized as a socialist government, and they probably do just as much forecasting and planning, and they apparently succeed (most of the time)."

Leave out the "(most of the time)" and it sounds like typical megacorporations always succeed.

I don't think you were being manipulative there, and I don't think the author of this TeX/LaTex essay is being manipulative now.

Re: The LaTeX Fetish (2016)

#139

Post by shalmanese »

Derbasti wrote: post #117
TrickyRick wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.chachatelier.fr/latexit/ is a solution to that. Write your math in Latex > export as image. I always use that whenever I have to display math in something which doesn't support Latex.

Can Word import PDF? How would I keep editable copies of the Math code? I use a similar workflow for PowerPoint slides, where I have dozens of files with a minimal LaTeX template that render math fragments to tiny PDF files, which I can then include in the PowerPoint slides. It's a huge pain. (But less painful than LaTeX beamer).

Word Equation editor supports Latex input: https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/murrays/2017/07/30/latex-ma...

Re: The LaTeX Fetish (2016)

#140

Post by panglott »

moomin wrote: post #71

So, to demonstrate how bad LaTeX is, he picks the single most markup heavy thing you do (barring tables) and compares it to plain text? Plain text, I'll point out, that doesn't format the same way. In practice, there _are_ a bunch of extra steps to get this working in Word, they're just not easy to express in a text document. Then he goes on to show the example of trying to find a spelling error. Ignoring that this j…

To demonstrate what a barrier LaTeX is, he illustrates by writing the title of a paper, the author, date, and first line. The result is obviously human-readable in a word processer without special training, but not in LaTeX.
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