Bert Lloyd writes: > > Dear LyX-users, > > I am writing some scripts to create PDFs from a number of LyX files. I > use Windows, but to maximize cross-platform portability, I'm writing > the scripts for Cygwin so that they can run on unix and MacOS. I would > like to know whether one of the following three options is preferable: > > 1. Add my current Windows installation of LyX and MikTeX to my Cygwin > PATH variable, so cygwin can find lyx.exe, etc.
This works provided that you take into account that a native version of LyX cannot use neither scripts nor commands that are symlinks. If you need one of such commands you have to write a wrapper batch file. Often, they can be one liners of the kind @bash -c 'script_or_symlink_name %*' > 2. In Cygwin, install the most recent version of LyX (and, presumably, > texlive or some other latex engine) and run the cygwin scripts using > these. While there can be some issues using a Cygwin TeX engine with a native LyX version (but it can be done), a Cygwin version of LyX can use without problems a native TeX engine. So, if you install LyX/Cygwin and already have, say MikTeX, you don't need installing texlive in Cygwin. > 3. Download the tar.gz Cygwin binary directly from > http://www.lyx.org/Download and [install? compile?] it. This is > currently a bit beyond my ability, although I could learn. That tar.gz contains a Cygwin package to be installed through the setup.exe installation tool. Simply untar it (using the Cygwin tar version, not a native one) and follow the instructions in the README file. This version does not use an X server and is visually identical to the native version. > Any other general tips for Cygwin and LyX are of course appreciated. If you already use Cygwin, then install the Cygwin version of LyX. If you only sporadically need Cygwin, then install the native version of LyX and use wrapper batch files to call the commands you need. If you need interoperability with unix and MacOS, then definitely install the Cygwin version of LyX. -- Enrico
