On 2023-11-15 23:31, Richard Kimberly Heck wrote:
On 11/15/23 05:47, Daniel wrote:
I recently discovered that I might have been using LyX Notes while I
should have been using Comment notes. I was wondering why LyX Notes
inherit the font (https://www.lyx.org/trac/ticket/12939). Comment
notes do not inherit the font of the surrounding text which seems
sensible for a comment. LyX Notes inherit and they seem to be fitting
for commenting out parts of a document out.
My guess is that the commenting feature is what people typically
expect when inserting a "sticky note" (see PDF readers' similar
features and other word processors). The prominent positioning of LyX
Notes (as the only notes in the toolbar) and the visualization (as a
sticky note) seems to have mislead me over the years to expect that
they are the analogue for what is found in other applications. What I
really wanted to do most of the time is put a comment into the text.
The difference is that comments are exported as comments, whereas notes
are never exported. So I would use a comment where in LaTeX I would do:
% this is a comment
This is probably not a very common thing for most users to do. I'm not
sure I've ever used a comment! I always use LyX Notes for, well, notes
to myself (or my collaborators), which I do not usually want in the
exported LaTeX (which I might be sending to a journal).
That said, LyX uses a comment *environment* for the export, which means
that you can \renewenvironment{comment} if you want them printed somehow.
It would be possible (and might make good sense) to make the toolbar
button a drop down sort of thing, like with View, so you could choose
the note type from there.
A couple of things would be nice.
1. Make Comments more prominent and visualize them as sticky notes
instead of LyX Notes.
I'm curious whether you still think this is needed, given what I've just
said. I'm also not sure what you mean by "visualized as sticky notes".
Comments and notes look the same to me (in LyX), except for the color
choices.
2. Allow free spacing in Comments. That is typically a feature in
sticky notes in other applications which is handy if one wants just to
quickly type stuff down without bothering with special formatting.
Easy to do in Local Layout. Not to say it wouldn't be a good default. I
wouldn't want to do it now, though, as that is a format change (since
'free spacing' would get eaten on conversion to older formats).
3. Make it optional whether Comments are exported or not. Another
typical feature. There could be both a global (for all comments)
setting and a local (for individual comments).
Comments are always exported---as comments. If you want to make export
conditional (in a broadly global way), then use branches. Or you can do
something like:
InsetLayout Note:Comment
LatexName MyComment
Preamble
\newenvironment{MyComment}{...}{...}
EndPreamble
End
To get local control, define a Flex inset and give it an argument which
acts as a flag: Visible or not. I.e., if the flag is empty, it acts like
a comment; if not, then it acts like some other environment, or just
prints the argument.
One thing that would be cool, actually, would be to be able to define
new kinds of Note insets, the way we do Flex insets, but have them then
be handled like other notes. E.g.:
InsetLayout Note:MyNote
Etc
End
And now that would appears in the Notes menu and context menu.
Riki
By "visualized as sticky notes", I meant that the (default) toolbar
button for LyX Notes shows a sticky note icon and the inset has a yellow
color (though not a very pleasant one). I don't see why sticky notes on
a text should inherit font. Also, if you use LyX Notes for comments to
collaborators, isn't it annoying when you put a note on a heading and
get this massive inset due to font inheritance?
Even if the toolbar would provide all different note insets, I still
think that it could be improved. You say that you use LyX Notes because
these are comments to your collaborators and you don't want them to be
in the final LaTeX file send to a journal. But couldn't there be a case
where you want some people to get the comments in LaTeX but not others?
Why do I have to make a decision on this by choosing a particular note.
Yes, I could put stuff into branches but it feels a bit like taking a
sledgehammer to break a nut. I must confess that I have never really
used branches. But it seems to me that a seemingly simple decisions
about whether notes should be exported shouldn't depend on having used
branches or a specific note type rather than another.
Another awesome thing would of course be even the option to export the
notes to PDF. But I am getting carried away...
It just seems to me that the default commenting in LyX taking could be
improved to be more useful to the user.
Daniel
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