On Thu, 27 Mar 2008, Steve Litt wrote:
I think the above list costs a couple hundred bucks.
Used from Amazon: about $125.00 plus shipping/handling.
For someone like you or me, whose career depends on LaTeX, that's no big deal, but the person just getting his or her feet wet might not want to take such a big plunge.
If you're going to be using the software extensively, then it's an investment, not a cost. In William's case, VP has been dead for about 6 years, so it's time to move on. Besides, the rational thing to do is buy the books one at a time: GTL4 first, then TCL2, and finally (if at all), TLGC2. Makes it much more affordable. My career doesn't depend on LaTeX; I could get by with AbiWord or OO.o's Writer.
A few free Ebook classics like LaTeX2E by Lamport, "The Not So Short Introduction to LaTeX2E" by Oetiker, Partl, Hyna and Schlegl (especially good), can get one started until the committment to purchase books can be raised.
As Richard pointed out with his extensive Web-based bibliography, there are abundant resources available for the price of a 'Net connection.
Once again, my experience is that learning TeX before learning LaTeX is a *must*. TeX is easy to learn, and once the learner knows TeX, LaTeX will *make much more sense.
My experience is different. When I get the time I'll read Knuth's "The TeXbook," but I've been learning LaTeX (to supplement what LyX doesn't automatically include and to produce documents that LyX cannot) for a half-dozen years or so. Finally getting serious about it. And what can't LyX do, but LaTeX does exceptionally well, you ask? One thing is precision forms. With Herbert's always-patient help, I created an OMR (Optical Mark Reader) form in LaTeX. The timing marks, data blocks, and overall placement on the page must be precise to the nearest millimeter in order to be correctly read by the OMR scanner. Gotta' know LaTeX for this. Rich -- Richard B. Shepard, Ph.D. | Integrity Credibility Applied Ecosystem Services, Inc. | Innovation <http://www.appl-ecosys.com> Voice: 503-667-4517 Fax: 503-667-8863
