Daniel Vainsencher <daniel.vainsenc...@gmail.com> writes: > I would suggest some connections between seemingly different projects > here:
I agree that they could be liked, especially in regards to the underlying infrastructure needed for a roundtrip. > 1. For round tripping, there is a close link between the exporter and > importer, because the importer must understand, in addition to the > external format, the side information provided by the exporter (say, > math-macro defs). Exactly. And especially because of this reason, I don't think the round-trip converter should be identical to the one-way exporter. A one-way exporter will (should?) always be better in converting one-way-only without a reasonably simple way back, because it will try to write everything in exactly the format used by the target format. On the other hand, the round trip converter will only convert a subset as good as possible, and keep the rest in meta information for return import. So these two have a different aim. > 2. The structure of a round-trip exporter-importer may be similar > between different external formats. Up to a certain point, as round-trip via LaTeX will be able to include many more features then round-trip via docx. But it should be possible to embed these two in the same framework. > > So it might be useful to describe this project as "round-trip > collaboration", giving latex and some other format (say, docx) as the > first two goals instances, but designing it with a hope for > generality. I think that would be an excellent idea, as it would make using new formats easier in the future then developing everything new. Sounds like a very useful project idea to me. Cheers, Rainer > It is sometimes said that design for a general case should > occur after solving three particular instances, but I hope someone > with more technical LyX background will chime in. > > Daniel > > On 04/18/2013 12:52 PM, Rainer M. Krug wrote: > > stefano franchi <stefano.fran...@gmail.com> writes: > > > On Thu, Apr 18, 2013 at 9:50 AM, Rainer M. Krug <rai...@krugs.de> > wrote: > > > Liviu Andronic <landronim...@gmail.com> writes: > > > Dear Daniel, > > > On Sun, Apr 14, 2013 at 10:26 AM, Daniel Vainsencher > <daniel.vainsenc...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > Please CC me on answers. > > I often collaborate with people who (still) prefer LaTeX, and also > > submit > > > papers to conferences that make it easy to submit latex > via > style/class/sample.tex files. This makes it important to be able to > > work in > > > LyX, but debug/modify in latex, then continue working in > LyX. > > I would strongly agree with this. Round-tripping LyX <--> > LaTeX > documents is one of the long-term goals of LyX. And in my > understanding this is something that lies in the realm of achievable. > What we need is, mostly, for a devel or student to show more love to > the tex2lyx conversion routines. > > > > It would probably be difficult to preserve latex source > formatting etc, > > and > > > I am not proposing that; I am assuming the main source of > content is > > LyX. > > > > Two particular features would make this easier: > > - Math-macros, if turned into \global\long\def, should be turned back so > LyX's beautiful visual editing is restored (can keep the math-macro def > > in a > > > comment in the latex version and restore it). > BTW, when does a math-macro become a \newcommand vs \global\long\def? > > - Automatically generate styles for environments defined in imported > documents. For example if the imported latex has a keywords environment, > that should not suddenly become ERT in LyX. > This should allow me to start from the conference sample file, import it > into LyX, and obtain a first class lyx environment. > > Both your suggestions look useful, although I'm wondering how > achievable is the 2nd one. I'd love to hear what established devels > think of this. > > Either way, I think this is a project worthy for GSoC and if you can > come up with a suitably worded project proposal feel free to place it > here: http://wiki.lyx.org/Devel/SummerOfCode2013Ideas (and let us know > on lyx-devel). This would greatly increase the chances of a student > picking it up. And if we have no student for such a project this year, > we should certainly consider it for subsequent GSoC summers. > > > While we are talking about roundtrip - there is still the dreaded issue > of MS Word (docx) roundtrip. > > There is again and again the discussion coming up of exporting to docx > and importing docx, and (especially in the humanities as I gather from > these discussions) many journals only accept doc / docx for submission. > > > Absolutely! A minimum level of compatibility with MS Word (or > openOffice) > would be a great boon to LyX. Actually, I think roundtripping, while > > > Sorry - haven't mentioned openOffice / LibreOffice. But I encountered > quite a few problrms with their odt - docx - odt conversions, that I > think an .lyx -> .odt converter is a different story. > > > desirable is probably out of reach for even moderately complex > documents. > > > I don't know enough about the docx format, but as you say below, if one > > 1) defines a set of desired features for the roundtrip > > 2) agrees on a way on how to deal with the other features (putting them > in comment sections or accompanying second file, so that they can be > re-applied on the re-import?) > > 3) uses these guidelines to develop the round-trip converter lyx -> docx > and docx -> lyx > > it should be doable and possible to grow the converters over time y > adding new features supported. Even a warning of non-supported formating > features would relatively easy to accomplish (do the round-trip and > see). > > > What is really needed is a decent LyX --> doc export filter, and > precisely > for the reasons Rainer mentioned: most publishers in the humanities accept > .doc only. Ideally, an export filter to doc should preserve semantically > relevant formatting (emphasis, footnotes, refs, cross-ref, and little else) > and discard everything else. > > > I can not agree more - but that could be separate from the round-trip > converters. > A non-round-trip converter could be present to convert as > many features as possible *without* round-trip support. > > Rainer > > > > Stefano > > > > > > Not only the journals, but the use of LateX and LyX is not that > widespread (as it should be!) in academia in general (some natural > science disciplines excluded). > > So to make co-operation with MS Word users possible, an improved export > to docx and round trip would be very useful. > > Also, I would assume that this feature would make LyX much > more widely used. > > Cheers, > > Rainer > > > > > Regards , > Liviu > > > > -- > Rainer M. Krug, PhD (Conservation Ecology, SUN), MSc (Conservation > Biology, UCT), Dipl. Phys. (Germany) > > Centre of Excellence for Invasion Biology > Stellenbosch University > South Africa > > Tel : +33 - (0)9 53 10 27 44 > Cell: +33 - (0)6 85 62 59 98 > Fax : +33 - (0)9 58 10 27 44 > > Fax (D): +49 - (0)3 21 21 25 22 44 > > email: rai...@krugs.de > > Skype: RMkrug > > > > <#secure method=pgpmime mode=sign> -- Rainer M. Krug, PhD (Conservation Ecology, SUN), MSc (Conservation Biology, UCT), Dipl. Phys. (Germany) Centre of Excellence for Invasion Biology Stellenbosch University South Africa Tel : +33 - (0)9 53 10 27 44 Cell: +33 - (0)6 85 62 59 98 Fax : +33 - (0)9 58 10 27 44 Fax (D): +49 - (0)3 21 21 25 22 44 email: rai...@krugs.de Skype: RMkrug
