# LaTEX is sweet! **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 4, 2001, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448 "2001-11-04T17:38:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Balduran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cc9497/32.png) [@Balduran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balduran)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/1 "2001-11-04T17:38:03Z")
I’m using the LYX front-end. Damn, I never thought I could actually have such good looking equations so easily. ---
**Author:** ![Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/96bed5/32.png) [@Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patty_O_Furniture)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/2 "2001-11-04T17:49:14Z")
Okay I came in here expecting to see some latex dammit! Nothing? Do you have _anything_ in rubber? ---
**Author:** ![ladyfoxfyre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ad7895/32.png) [@ladyfoxfyre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ladyfoxfyre)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/3 "2001-11-04T17:56:05Z")
Who’s got good looking equations? Oh, **Balduran** , how you doin’? ---
**Author:** ![Balduran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cc9497/32.png) [@Balduran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balduran)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/4 "2001-11-04T18:12:33Z")
Hee hee **Attrayant**! Part of the reason dorks like using word processor a like LaTeX (accidentally capped the e in the title) is it makes us sound wild. : **ladyfoxfyre** swoons before my 12 pt Times New Roman and Helvetica iso8859-1 fonts : ---
**Author:** ![Balduran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cc9497/32.png) [@Balduran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balduran)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/5 "2001-11-04T18:17:01Z")
_a word processor like_ Of course, I’m not one of those dorks. ---
**Author:** ![Erika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/47e85d/32.png) [@Erika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Erika)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/6 "2001-11-04T18:22:30Z")
LaTeX is sweet. Congrats on finding it. :😁: And remember, always practice safe math. Encode _all_ documents in LaTeX! [borrowed from a friend] ---
**Author:** ![Earthling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/90db22/32.png) [@Earthling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earthling)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/7 "2001-11-04T18:22:44Z")
Except that when you _say_ LaTeX, the ending is a “ch” (as in loch) sound, not “ks.” Oof, I’m a geek. On a less dorky note, we used to have a DJ on our local community radio station who went by the name of Elmo Latex. ---
**Author:** ![Balduran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cc9497/32.png) [@Balduran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balduran)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/8 "2001-11-04T18:27:42Z")
> [@](#): > > And remember, always practice safe math. Encode all documents in LaTeX! Yeah! now I’ve got a new joke to tell at my next D&D game! I’ll consider artistic liscense **Earth** ---
**Author:** ![Finagle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b19c9b/32.png) [@Finagle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Finagle)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/9 "2001-11-04T18:35:18Z")
It’s true that there’s nothing like trying to format some documentation in Word to make you appreciate LaTEX. I have no idea how the text processor that 95% of the country relies on gets away with being so lame at handling diagrams and captions. ---
**Author:** ![waterj2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/858c86/32.png) [@waterj2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/waterj2)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/10 "2001-11-04T18:38:01Z")
> [@](#): > > : **ladyfoxfyre** swoons before my 12 pt Times New Roman and Helvetica iso8859-1 fonts : What? Not Computer Modern? How will people know it’s LaTeX if it’s notin Computer Modern? Another LaTeX lover here. That program can do anything. ---
**Author:** ![Avumede](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/avumede/32/7235_2.png) [@Avumede](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Avumede)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/11 "2001-11-04T19:41:15Z")
I have a love/hate relationship to it. It’s powerful and easy get great looking equations (once you know how), and actually everything looks awesome with it. On the other hand, it’s hell. When doing word processing, should you really have to worry about whether your document will compile or not? It’s pretty much a usability nightmare all around. I’ll have to check out the LYX front end. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/12 "2001-11-04T20:22:03Z")
I did my dissertation in LaTeX - department requirement, IIRC - but given my druthers, I’d have preferred Word with Equation Editor. Maybe the formulas wouldn’t have looked _quite_ as neat, but it would have been a _hell_ of a lot easier. ---
**Author:** ![Balduran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cc9497/32.png) [@Balduran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balduran)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/13 "2001-11-04T20:32:40Z")
I wrote my Master’s thesis and a half-dozen papers in Word and Word Perfect and I was getting damn sick and tired of having to set them on 5 minute backups to protect my work and my equations looking like my cat barfed them out. Now that I’m doing my Doctoral thesis, I didn’t want to go through that again. I always hesitated to use LaTex before because I didn’t want to learn yet another programming language. LYX makes it really easy though, you don’t have to worry about coding in all the mundane things, it has a little point and click equation editor, point and click figure and table insertion and for the difficult stuff, it has a LaTeX console. It’s like Scientific Workplace but good. Right now my thesis is crap, but it’s the best looking crap I’ve ever written. ---
**Author:** ![Erika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/47e85d/32.png) [@Erika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Erika)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/14 "2001-11-04T21:04:43Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RTFirefly \* > \*\*I did my dissertation in LaTeX - department requirement, IIRC - but given my druthers, I’d have preferred Word with Equation Editor. Maybe the formulas wouldn’t have looked _quite_ as neat, but it would have been a _hell_ of a lot easier. \*\* Oh, no…::shivers:: I’d much rather play in LaTeX than deal with the hell that is Equation Editor…even Math Type. ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/15 "2001-11-04T23:33:35Z")
LYX? Bah! Real men code LaTeX from scratch. ---
**Author:** ![Balduran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cc9497/32.png) [@Balduran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balduran)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/16 "2001-11-04T23:43:03Z")
Hey now, if you’re going to turn this into a “my pocket protector is bigger than yours”, we’d better step into the pit. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [November 4, 2001, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/17 "2001-11-04T23:53:18Z")
Guess what? I’m gonna one-up all y’all: This one time, at band camp (OK, it was actually at university) I _met_ and _talked to_ Donald E. Knuth, the dude who invented TeX. And I got him to sign my copy of the first volume of _The Art of Computer Programming_. ---
**Author:** ![waterj2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/858c86/32.png) [@waterj2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/waterj2)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2001, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/18 "2001-11-05T00:19:50Z")
OK, I’ll admit it, I’m jealous. ---
**Author:** ![BlackKnight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eb8c5e/32.png) [@BlackKnight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlackKnight)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2001, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/19 "2001-11-05T00:21:48Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by friedo \* > \*\*This one time, at band camp (OK, it was actually at university) I _met_ and _talked to_ Donald E. Knuth, the dude who invented TeX. > And I got him to sign my copy of the first volume of _The Art of Computer Programming_. \*\* _bows humbly_ ---
**Author:** ![Terminus\_Est](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terminus_est/32/3087_2.png) [@Terminus\_Est](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terminus_Est)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2001, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/latex-is-sweet/91448/20 "2001-11-05T02:05:23Z")
We’re not worthy! We’re not worthy!