[pdftex] MS Word hell, TeX heaven?

[Reinhard Kotucha]

>>>>> "John" == John Culleton <john at wexfordpress.com> writes:

    > My complaints are several. First it is too wordy. 

In most cases this is an advantage.  Especially in an environment
where it is quite easy to define shortcuts.

    > Second, it assumes that your document falls within a small
    > set of of types.

This might be the reason that LaTeX is used for writing thesesis only,
though it could be used for everything.  My experience (from obeying
people using LaTeX) is, that LaTeX is easy to use, but nobody tried to
write his own class file.  In LaTeX 2e you can say
"\LoadClass{article}" and then redefine some of the macros, but I
think that too much programming skill and too much knowledge about
LaTeX's internals are needed.

A better way to create class files is to just load highly configurable
packages.  I suppose that this is what LaTeX3 will do.
 
    > Third, there is no single guide to all of LaTeX. It takes
    > several books, most of them obsolete.  

There are two books you need, Lamports book describes the LaTeX core
and the LaTeX Companion describes the packages that are part of the
LaTeX distribution.  The problem is that people don't know which books
they need...

    > Fourth, the various and sundry LaTeX macros can conflict
    > with one another.

Yes, at least theoretically.  I'm using LaTeX for about 12 years and I
never had such a problem.  If you ever encounter such a problem,
report it here (and Robin will take you to the corresponding FAQ entry).

    > Fifth, unlike pdftex and Context, the plain TeX commands are not
    > supported.

What do you mean whith "supported"?  You can use plain TeX within
LaTeX, though you must know what you're doing.
 
    > And there are other math tools outside of the
    > world of TeX, not as good as, but passable. I edited the LaTeX
    > parts of an academic journal where 60% of the articles were done
    > in MSWord in final form.

\usepackage{amsfonts} and try the same with Word.

    >> One has only to look at the nightmare that is XML
    > Thus far I have avoided looking at it. What is it for?

It's useful, definitely.  If you don't need it, it's good for nothing.

Regards,
  Reinhard

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Reinhard Kotucha			             Phone: +49-511-27060390
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Microsoft isn't the answer. Microsoft is the question, and the answer is NO.
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