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Subject:Re: TeX vs. LaTeX vs. Lout vs. troff/groff/nroff From:"Janet Swisher" <swisher -at- enthought -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Fri, 14 May 2004 13:32:48 -0500
Mats Broberg wrote:
>A plunge into the dark waters of antique - although very capable! -
>typesetting languages...
>I'd be interested to know if anyone of you use TeX or LaTeX when writing
>and maintaining your technical documentation - or even Lout or
>troff/groff/nroff etc.
>Pros and cons of these different languages?
I can speak to LaTeX (and TeX a little) but not *roff or Lout.
I currently have a legacy document written in LaTeX, and 10+ years ago I
edited my then-husband's academic papers in LaTeX (and tweaked a style file
(i.e., template) to match his university's dissertation requirements).
You don't want to work directly in TeX unless you really have to. LaTeX has
all the infrastructure for marking up document structure, whereas TeX is
much more at the bare-bones page-layout level. One analogy (I think from
Leslie Lamport's book on LaTeX) is that TeX is like the souped-up sports
car, while LaTeX is like the family station wagon -- it doesn't have as much
top-end capability, but it's a lot easier to handle for every-day use.
If you need to typeset complex mathematical equations, *nothing* beats
LaTex/TeX. (That's what they were created for.) Beyond that, I can't really
address pros and cons without knowing more about your requirements (such as
why you are looking at "antique" systems).
If you go with LaTeX, you might consider LyX as a front-end: http://www.lyx.org/
-------------------------
Janet Swisher
Senior Technical Writer
Enthought, Inc.
1-512-536-1057
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