[OS X TeX] your wiki needs you?

[Maarten Sneep]

On 17 sep 2008, at 22:25, Dr. Clea F. Rees wrote:

[snip] a functional classification of editors, viewers and front-ends  
(or integrated systems).

> TextMate has a viewer. Therefore it goes on the Front Ends page. That
> it uses WebKit doesn't change that really - that isn't an application.
> The user need know nothing of WebKit (or Cocoa or...).

I still would put TextMate in the editor category. Yes, webkit sort of  
works, but you do not get synchronized viewing or juming between  
source and pdf. I think that that is an essential feature of present  
day systems - yes, things change, it's called progress, and I'm happy  
with it. You can do the same with TextMate, but then you're in the  
same category as BBEdit et al.

> I agree it is artificial. There are grey areas. Distinctions are often
> like that. But I think it is still useful - especially to somebody
> trying to figure out what's needed to start out.

Sure.

> Both the Editors page and the Viewers page contain explanatory notes
> and links at the top. They both have additional links at the bottom.
>
> Not everything on the viewers page has synctex/pdfsync integration,
> either. (Preview? Adobe Reader?)

Correct. Preview will now at least re-load a pdf when told to open a  
file that it has already open, and keep it in the same location. That  
is a huge simplification for basic viewing, and scripting the updates.  
Acrobat (no cost edition) is still horrible. Skim is my favorite at  
the moment.

> At least, this is how I've been interpreting the distinction. I think
> the only other way to do it would be to put everything on one page -
> front ends, editors and viewers. But that would make for a rather
> unmanageable page, I think.

Agreed, it is not that I don't think the classification is wrong, but  
my impression of TextMate is more of an editor (with decent LaTeX  
support, but not even out of the box IIRC), than a complete front end.

Yes, I could edit right now, but no-one wants an edit-war ;-)

Maarten