On 12/27/2014 01:38 AM, tsd wrote:
> "Given these numbers it remains an open question to determine the
> amount of taxpayer money that is spent worldwide for researchers to
> use LaTeX over a more efficient document preparation system, which
> would free up their time to advance their respective field.
The key here is the definition of "more efficient". Efficiency is
normally regarded as a measure of how well the effort achieves the goal;
that is, "how well" in this sense is a qualitative measure (there are
specific quantitative measures in its more restricted sense in
engineering, physics, etc where accepted formulae exist).
The use of LaTeX by poorly-instructed users, or by users with
insufficient understanding of the concept of a structured document, will
typically be less efficient (ie take more effort) than the use of Word
by the same users, no matter how poorly instructed, because the goal of
these users is to create a visually attractive or conformant document
(in their eyes). The goal of the well-instructed user with a proper
understanding of structure is to create a robust and durable document
that will outlast all other formats as well as be visually attractive or
conformant.
This paper only addresses the problems faced by the relatively novice
user with narrowly-defined goals, for which keystroke-level modelling is
useful. It would require a completely different methodology to address
the wider applicability of LaTeX vs Word by more experienced users,
which would include non-interactive factors such as document
persistence, mechanical reliability, and content re-use.
> "Some publishers may save a significant amount of money by requesting
> or allowing LaTeX submissions because a well-formed LaTeX document
> complying with a well-designed class file (template) is much easier
> to bring into their publication workflow. However, this is at the
> expense of the researchers' labor time and effort.
This is a good illustration of the case in point: among novice users,
there is significant time and effort required because there is a dual
learning curve: (a) for the concepts of structured documents and the
automation that is possible in LaTeX; and (b) the set of LaTeX commands
required to implement (a). This is not the case with seasoned authors
(Word or LaTeX) equipped with the proper tools, and this would require a
different approach.
> "We therefore suggest that leading scientific journals should
> consider accepting submissions in LaTeX only if this is justified by
> the level of mathematics presented in the paper. In all other cases,
> we think that scholarly journals should request authors to submit
> their documents in Word or PDF format.
PDF is unlikely to gain acceptance from publishers because entry to the
workflow at the PDF stage presupposes that the document has been
competently formatted by a typesetter. While it is perfectly possible
for the seasoned user of LaTeX to achieve this, it may require even the
seasoned Word user additional effort.
> "We believe that this would be a good policy for two reasons. First,
> we think that the appearance of the text is secondary to the
> scientific merit of an article and its impact to the field.
There may be many Word and LaTeX users who disagree with this. If the
scientific merit cannot be ascertained because it is obscured by
incompetent formatting, it may fail this test, but that is not a reason
for discarding the test, it's an argument for making better systems.
> "And, second, preventing researchers from producing documents in
> LaTeX would save time and money to maximize the benefit of research
> and development for both the research team and the public."
The amount of time and money saved may be inconsequential compared with
the overall cost of a research project, especially in view of the
subsequent accessibility risk for documents which lack reusable markup
(both LaTeX and Word).
///Peter
--
Claimer: I was a reviewer of this paper.
I will address some of the other comments in separate messages.