Re: Replacement for Abiword: LyX? Openoffice?
On Mon, Oct 06, 2003 at 05:46:34AM -0300, Ben Armstrong wrote:
> On Mon, Oct 06, 2003 at 09:44:36AM +0200, Andreas Tille wrote:
> > Do you think that the only RC-bug (#213660) which is even tagged patch and
> > the package is actively maintained needs reaction? I guess all other dependancies
> > (according to http://qa.debian.org/developer.php?excuse=abiword will be solved
> > before Sarge release).
>
> I'm hoping it will be acted on by the maintainer. The bug was only filed a
> few days ago. However, I need to be prepared for the worst, hence my line
> of questioning.
>
> > > Should I replace abiword with LyX? This will considerably increase the size
> > > of Debian Jr. because to be truly useful, I believe I also need to include
> > > tetex, which is massive. Furthermore, there is the question of whether LyX
> > > is truly a word processor that children can use.
> > To be honest I try to teach my son LaTeX for didactical purpose. Once somebody
> > knows logical markup he is able to use any textprocessor.
>
> Sure, but LyX doesn't really help with that, does it, since it conceals the
> details of TeX? Might as well just go straight to a textprocessor and skip
> word processing.
Not exactly. In LyX it is hard to create for example section heading
the "wrong" way - by selecting large font and leaving couple of empty
lines above and below. Try it and you will see how hard it is. But it
is extremely easy to create heasing by simply selecting a "section"
paragraph style. The same goes for things like numbered lists. LyX is
supposed to conceal the texhnical detais of LaTeX, not the princilples
of logical markup.
Several people mentioned writing reports: mu daughter created several
reports for her school in both Abiword and LyX, and I don't think she
noticed much difference. I taught her from the beginning to use logical
markup (paragraph styles) in abiword, and in LyX she ended up doing
pretty much exactly the same as in abi.
I think the main difference between LyX and wordprocessor is that in LyX
you cannot (or et least it is hard) create things like posters, and
funny document with unusuall formating etc. LyX pretty much forces you
to stick to the logical format. I think that may have a great
educational value.
I agree LyX can't be a drop in replacement for abiword, but I wouldn't
really mind if you remove a wodprocessor and include LyX instead. But
then I may be in minority on this.
--
Jan Hlavacek (260) 434-7566
Department of Mathematics Jhlavacek@sf.edu
University of Saint Francis http://www.sf.edu/jhlavacek/
Reply to: