RE: [Groff] eqn plugin for MS Word??

[Ted Harding]

On 09-Aug-07 23:08:54, Frank Jahnke wrote:
> I am writing a highly-technical review article with a colleague who
> knows only MS Word on the Mac (and so is not particularly
> computer-savvy).  I've agreed to use Word, for which I don't much care,
> but it seems to be the only way to go at the moment.  Of course I am
> doing the parts that have the heavy math -- in eqn (which I would
> otherwise use) this would be easy, but Word's equation editor is pretty
> weak.
> 
> Is anyone aware of a eqn plugin for Word?  Or something like it?
> 
> I know the OO.o has an equation mode that is very similar to eqn, but
> I've simply not had very good luck with OO.o for these sorts of
> documents when sharing with Word is necessary.
> 
> Frank

Sympathies! I've been there myself, and it was very painful.

You're right in that Word's equation editor is weak, and also
clumsy to use. But in the end I had to use it.

Once upon a time (back in Word 3.1, so say 15 years ago) you could
type in eqn-like code; but the results weren't particularly good.
Also, WordPerfect had a text-based equation editor which was very
close to basic eqn, and produced excellent results (as far as it
went). I used to write a lot of heavy maths stuff in WordPerfect.
I don't know how (or indeed whether) WordPerfect stands these days.

In theory you could import from WordPerfect to Word. But this
didn't work very well for the equations side: Word would convert
every single element in an equation into a graphics object and
stick them onto an image like stamps. So a subscript could get
stuck on top of something else. Maybe that has improved (I'm
thinking back again to those early days).

Unfortunately I can't help with your query about "an eqn plugin
for Word" or similar. Maybe it's possible, if you can hit the
right G-spot with your mouse, to gain entry to some underlying
text-based equation description interface in Word, like there
used to be once upon a time. But I fear not -- the GUI Empire
would treat something as straightforward as that, as a threat
to its World Domination.

Good luck!
Ted.



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Date: 10-Aug-07                                       Time: 08:31:38
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