The LyX Latex Wordprocessor

LyX is a high level "what you see is what you mean" word processor that utilizes the power of the LaTeX typesetting system to speed document preparation. LyX provides a graphical user interface with most of the features of a moder word processor, but also permits access to the advanced features of TeX and LaTeX. Its features are summarized on its homepage.

LyX runs on Unix, Windows, and Macintosh. There are a number of prerequisites that must be installed first, most importantly TeX itself. For Unix, we recommend the teTeX distribution (http://www.tug.org/teTeX/.) Unix (Linux, Solaris, and SGI) systems that mount the appropriate directories from jeeves.itc.virginia.edu can use ITC's installation of teTeX as the base LaTeX installation. More information about installing and using LaTeX on Unix, Windows, and Mac OSX platforms is available at the ITC LaTeX Web page.

Instructions for downloading LyX are at . For Unix operating systems, such as Solaris, it can be built from source. Binaries are available for Linux and Macintosh; see the ftp site ftp://ftp.lyx.org/pub/lyx/bin/.

For Windows, we recommend the version at http://www.home.zonnet.nl/rareitsma/lyx/. Although ImageMagick is said to be "optional," we recommend that it be installed and that its convert command be in the default path. An explanation for adding to the system path in Windows 200 or Windows XP can be found here.

Existing latex documents can be converted into "lyx" format by using the reLyX.pl script. To convert the latex document, mylatex.tex, into a "lyx" document, type:

     relyx mylatex.tex

Note: As is the case with any converter, reLyX works better on some documents than others!

For more information on lyx see http://www.lyx.org/about/, or join the lyx mailing lists http://www.lyx.org/internet/mailing.php3.

Mail comments or questions on lyx to res-consult@virginia.edu

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