<html><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><br><div><div>On Jan 22, 2009, at 5:23 PM, George Gratzer wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><div>David,<br><br>Why are you so keen to expand the club? TeX was written by Knuth for his own use to write some books. He, and others, expanded it to other mathematicians. If for some reason non mathematicians want to use it, more power to them. But, really, why would anybody use Word, if the error messages were in C?<br><br>The interface you are looking for is available commercially: Scientific Word, I reviewed it for the Notices of the AMS in 1994, I believe. But you have to pay a stiff price.<br><br>A brand new version (for both Windows and Mac) will be out this year in the summer. I will review it in January 2010 in the Notices.<br><br>GG<br><br></div></blockquote><div><br></div>Hi, George.</div><div><br></div><div>I would like to expand the club because I think this tool is marvelous. Why wouldn't I want to introduce many more to it? </div><div><br></div><div>Not merely does it produce beautiful output, it does so efficiently. As I wrote earlier, God only knows what hours and dollars have been lost to the vagaries of MS Word. People's time shouldn't be wasted fooling around with lousy tools.</div><div><br></div><div>Thank you for writing my favorite book on LaTeX!</div><div><br></div><div>David Derbes</div><div>U of Chicago Laboratory Schools</div><div><br></div><div><blockquote type="cite"><div><br>On 22-Jan-09, at 4:28 PM, David Derbes wrote:<br><br><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">On Jan 22, 2009, at 6:11 AM, David B. Thompson, Ph.D., P.E., D.WRE, CFM wrote:<br></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">The fact is that this doesn't matter much to me, personally. I can carry my own water (mostly) with the tools at hand and should be able to finish out my career regardless of whether new tools evolve to hide the underlying mark-up required to use LaTeX. But you also have a valid point--if LaTeX (and TeX) are to survive this old dinosaur, then more development is required for one or more meta-tools that hide the details behind a (semi-) WYSIWYG shell. I haven't used LyX in forever, so I have no idea how it's faring these days. But something like it is required for the word-processing crowd. Otherwise, I think LaTeX runs the risk of fading away as those of us happy with text editors and command shells die off.<br></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">For what it's worth, there are those of us who've only learned LaTeX recently and yet do not trust WYSIWYG editors to produce reliable results. There is a whole new generation learning to edit plain text and pilot the command line as we speak…<br></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">The question which seemed occasionally to surface and which I was trying to address is NOT the relevance of LaTeX to the members of the club. Obviously, we all love and/or use LaTeX. The LaTeX club is also an open door club. In fact, the club makes every efforts to help others who have joined the club. There is nothing wrong with LaTeX inasmuch as it is what the club uses and loves. And I too have made my peace with LaTeX. So what?<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">The question I was trying to address was an entirely different one: it concerned the extent to which a LaTeX type software could one day replace MS Word in its role as the writing tool for the world outside the club.<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">My point is that if we can't even discuss what it is that currently prevents LaTeX from being the writing tool for the world outside the club—and we don't seem to be able to, then there isn't much of a chance that such a tool will ever see the light of the day.<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">But then, maybe it is in the very nature of any club not to worry about the outside world.<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">Regards<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">--schremmer----------- Please Consult the Following Before Posting -----------<br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">In fact I am extremely keen to expand the club. I show my students how to use LaTeX, my handouts are all in LaTeX (and the kids can have the source if they like), I try to convince my colleagues (especially in math), and I offer any help they ask for.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">I think two things prevent a wider use of LaTeX. First, the commands are scary looking at first. Then, it actually takes a while to type things out; it's understandable that people would rather grab from a palette the square root sign than type \sqrt{ }. Seven keystrokes versus a mouse click. I'm willing to spend the time to type the commands and to learn at least some of the intricacies (though heaven knows there's an awful lot I know nothing about, and may never learn), but clearly not everyone is. [I understand that there are front ends and utilities -- e.g., TeX FoG -- that reduce the typing to a mouse click.]<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">LaTeX was written by people of a mathematical mindset for the use of that same group. Not everyone belongs to this group.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">On the other hand, the talented team at Apple have been able to tame Unix, far more arcane in my experience, to the average person's ability to use it. Maybe in the not too distant future Apple or the Ubuntu guys or whoever will similarly tame LaTeX, so that its user interface is as friendly as Word or WordPerfect or Pages, but its beating heart and engine will still be good ol' industrial strength LaTeX.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">For the record, I doubt I would have tackled LaTeX without Dick Koch's (and others') TeXShop.<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">David Derbes<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">U of Chicago Lab Schools<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">TeX FAQ: <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/faq">http://www.tex.ac.uk/faq</a><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">List Reminders and Etiquette: <a href="http://email.esm.psu.edu/mac-tex/">http://email.esm.psu.edu/mac-tex/</a><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">List Archive: <a href="http://tug.org/pipermail/macostex-archives/">http://tug.org/pipermail/macostex-archives/</a><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">TeX on Mac OS X Website: <a href="http://mactex-wiki.tug.org/">http://mactex-wiki.tug.org/</a><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite">List Info: <a href="http://email.esm.psu.edu/mailman/listinfo/macosx-tex">http://email.esm.psu.edu/mailman/listinfo/macosx-tex</a><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">----------- Please Consult the Following Before Posting -----------<br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">TeX FAQ: <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/faq">http://www.tex.ac.uk/faq</a><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">List Reminders and Etiquette: <a href="http://email.esm.psu.edu/mac-tex/">http://email.esm.psu.edu/mac-tex/</a><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">List Archive: <a href="http://tug.org/pipermail/macostex-archives/">http://tug.org/pipermail/macostex-archives/</a><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">TeX on Mac OS X Website: <a href="http://mactex-wiki.tug.org/">http://mactex-wiki.tug.org/</a><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite">List Info: <a href="http://email.esm.psu.edu/mailman/listinfo/macosx-tex">http://email.esm.psu.edu/mailman/listinfo/macosx-tex</a><br></blockquote><blockquote type="cite"><br></blockquote><br>----------- Please Consult the Following Before Posting -----------<br>TeX FAQ: <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/faq">http://www.tex.ac.uk/faq</a><br>List Reminders and Etiquette: <a href="http://email.esm.psu.edu/mac-tex/">http://email.esm.psu.edu/mac-tex/</a><br>List Archive: <a href="http://tug.org/pipermail/macostex-archives/">http://tug.org/pipermail/macostex-archives/</a><br>TeX on Mac OS X Website: <a href="http://mactex-wiki.tug.org/">http://mactex-wiki.tug.org/</a><br>List Info: <a href="http://email.esm.psu.edu/mailman/listinfo/macosx-tex">http://email.esm.psu.edu/mailman/listinfo/macosx-tex</a><br><br></div></blockquote></div><br></body></html>