Re: RTF for emacs

[Emanuel Berg]

Robert Thorpe <rt@robertthorpeconsulting.com> writes:

>> Really, what *is* the use-case for "RTF"?
>
> What about writing a letter to your bank?

Your *what*? :)

> Or writing a short technical document that has to
> include diagrams?  Plain text can't really do these
> things.  Latex can do these things, but it's
> complicated.

It is, but you can usually make it work *once*, then
re-use the solution as your taste probably don't change
that much. (You don't need to bring up old stuff and
compare. Just do a skeleton and type in the new
stuff. Who cares if it gets wastefully intense. It
doesn't matter. It is not programming in that sense.)

The basic stuff isn't difficult, and the basic stuff
certainly includes the RTF stuff (boldface, lists,
simple math formulas etc.). Actually, the basic stuff
(that isn't difficult) gets you a lot more than from a
word processor.

Then, to get the details exactly the way you want can
take some time, yes. I always said, if people had
better taste to begin with, there wouldn't be such a
huge need to configure everything :P

I usually give it a couple of hours. For a detail, it
is insane, and even I (a perfectionist) would think it
crazy if it wasn't reusable ever after. Example: When I
wrote my BS thesis, I put as much time on the LaTeX as
on the silly M$ Access/VBA problem, then I wrote the MS
thesis and at that time I actually missed the LaTeX
hacking just a bit as there wasn't much left to do, I
had to focus on the actual task...

If you fail to get the detail right despite efforts,
turn to the SX TeX site or comp.text.tex - the TeX
people are very friendly and social, they are not like
programmers (I won't pretend to analyze that).

> Whenever I need to use Latex I have to look at lots
> of examples from the internet or the last time I used
> it.  Since I never write large reports using Latex
> it's syntax never sticks in my head.

Well, yeah, it is difficult like everything else and no
one said it should be simple.

> I use a word processor for these kind of things a
> present, Libreoffice.  I'd rather not do that though,
> it's clumsy.  If I had the time I'd help with adding
> RTF editing and/or word-processing to Emacs.
>
> Something I'm considering is using info format.  The
> info makeup is very simple (for the GNU manuals it's
> compiled from sources in a TeX dialect called
> TeXInfo, but it can be written directly).  Another
> possibility is using HTML.

Cool facts! But I don't think writing letters in info
or HTML makes any sense, sorry. Again, why not use
plain text and, if need be, LaTeX - it is better (than
RTF) and not that difficult, really, and, as for the
clumsy word processors, you don't get any of that just
typing away ASCII and LaTeX in your favourite editor...

-- 
underground experts united:
http://user.it.uu.se/~embe8573