The thing about writing large technical-ish documents is that it's entirely nonlinear. You're skipping back and forth between chapters, editing, adding bits, removing, etc. That makes it impossible to manage document layout midway. There's no point getting all your page breaks just perfect only to add a large paragraph somewhere and find now every page breaks halfway.

Mind you, this talk of LyX has my intrigued. When version 2.0 is out for Windows I'll definitely be giving it a serious test drive, maybe I'll write a mini-review too, but not till after I'm confident I gave it a fair chance.

I agree, Armando.  I've been looking into it a little more and I think I have to stick to Indesign.  I found this quote:

The learning curve for LaTeX is both deep and broad. In my opinion it's harder to learn than C, C++, Java, Perl and the like. But learn it you must, unless you're willing to accept every LyX default for the document class you've chosen.

I don't want to learn a programming language.  And I have to customize my content, i.e., I'm going to start from scratch.  There's just no way I'm going to use a style that someone else created.  I'm far too picky for that.

So now the question is, what can I do to automate Indesign?  The math stuff is the biggest headache.  All of the tools out there work, but they all have an issue here and there.  And the best one is very expensive, even for me.  It's like $700.  I want to use mathtype, but it has weird, minor issues with placing content into Indesign.  Everything else about it is perfect.

I agree, Armando.  I've been looking into it a little more and I think I have to stick to Indesign.  I found this quote:

Quote

The learning curve for LaTeX is both deep and broad. In my opinion it's harder to learn than C, C++, Java, Perl and the like. But learn it you must, unless you're willing to accept every LyX default for the document class you've chosen.

And I find this quote... a load of baloney. I have just been getting misty-eyed over some old TeX and LaTeX documents I wrote way back when, it's not hard at all. Maybe the person who wrote that quote has not done much programming.

    \[
       \frac{d}{dx}\left( \int_{0}^{x} f(u)\,du\right)=f(x).
    \]



Does that look so hard? 10 minutes with a tutorial.

Please... don't "link" me to that quote... LyX is effectively perfect for that type of stuff.
(And I agree : not that complicated. The main matter here IMO isn't "complication" per se but needs and workflow.)

Nevah! I had a feeling it was a quote from someone with quite limited experience 

It's like a lot of rewarding things - you can't just dip your toe in, so yes I agree it's got a learning curve. Maybe it's just that I'm wired in the right way - I got on with TeX and LaTeX very well. To my eye it's a lot easier to comprehend than, say, perl.

I suppose the main question is just how much does one really need to fart around with those style files. 90% of the time, those predefined styles are going to work just fine. I do feel there's quite a lot of customize for customization's sake going on.

Oh don't get me wrong - I was making a general statement about folks tinkering with layouts and styles and peppering it with my own personal opinion that different != better in many cases.

Of course not everyone is a programmer, nor has the time or inclination to create nice styles. But it may be that if you are able to exemplify exactly what you needed, some kind soul would step up to the plate and help you. Either here or on the Lyx site.

Or are you saying that you need a different style every time?

He doesn't like the math rendering.
Obviously InDesign doesn't do formula editing^w well.

I was wondering if perhaps there were an InDesign plugin to allow Latex-style formula editing and a quick search came up with this:
MathMagic Pro for InDesign
http://www.mathmagic.com/product/prowin.html

Holy crow it's 500 bucks!! 
NVM...

Listen, Eóin is right when he said Latex was primarily invented for folks who write large bodies of documentation, voluminous research papers, etc. where you can't be bothered with things like 'what style did I apply on page 4,215 because I need it for 3 pages out of chapter 172.05' kind of stuff.
In fact it's BRILLIANT for things like that, but it could simply be the wrong tool for what you want and the kind of content you are producing.

In keeping in the spirit of this site, let's think of the problem in Programmer's terms.
These are admittedly not exactly accurate, but just for illustration's sake:

Your writing = code.
Latex = compiler.
Classes = language rules (java, C, fortran, etc.).
Lyx = IDE.

Would you agree that code for a simple application is much easier to write than the compiler and language definitions that make it into a nice pretty executable?
Therein lies the rub.

Aram, my advice to you is to either stick with InDesign because you already know it and presumably can work around it's shortcomings, or set aside a day to sit down with Lyx and chew through the tutorials and documentation.
Not opinions, not others' experiences, just you alone coming to terms with what it can and can't do for you and your writing.
I sincerely believe all your questions will be answered there and either you'll come to a blinding realization that it's all painfully true and Lyx will never do or be what you need, or you'll discover some elusive secret that actually proves it to be so much easier than everybody here makes it out to be.

May the force be with you...

At the risk of provoking a burst of laughter, the way my company used to handle mathematical formulas was to use a high-end math symbol Postscript font and create all the formulas using Adobe Illustrator. We selected a drawing app in order to get extremely fine control over symbol placement, scaling, and positioning.

My former business partner was a typography expert that didn't believe in automating certain things when it came to characters or symbols. His approach was to treat mathematical formulas as pictures rather than as text since they would never change once they were created.

After a formula was created, it was saved as a (scalable vector format) illustration so that it could be dropped in and re-sized as and where needed. This was a major up-front pain to do. But once the formula "art" was created (and proofed/approved) it was very easy to catalog for future reuse.

We did a 1200-page technical manual for a Fortune 10 company where we built a library of about 200 formulas. This came in handy down the road when we were contracted to produce some additional manuals.

Having a library of the requisite formulas allowed us to hold down our costs and shorten our delivery times such that we beat out several larger competitors for future editions of this manual. We had a major advantage because we didn't have to redo - or proof - hundreds of  formulas we didn't actually understand. And because the formulas were art - there was no danger of a typo error creeping in once we had done the initial proofing.

Maybe not the most elegant or 'techy' way to do it. But our approach worked quite well, both for the initial project and its revisions.

40hz, something very much like that occurred to me in considering this issue.

Doesn't surprise me. It's a fairly logical way to do it once you think about it. I make no claim for originality.

If we knew more about the original project requirements here I think it would help determine the best approach though.

- Oshyan

I think Aram mentioned what he was doing in a previous thread. He's creating study review guides to help people prepare for a professional licensing exam.

Actually, 40, had I not suggested mathtype to my partner, he was going to do it just as you said: creating the vector art directly in the program (Indesign, not Illustrator, although he was doing it there also).
Your way is logical, and also just cool.  I actually wouldn't mind doing it (I'm very particular about how to present math solutions properly).  But in our case, it's clearly not a good use of time and resources.  You're more like my partner in this stuff, he enjoys the personal touch in all of this.  

When I used to design more in my early career, I was very proud of my CAD toolbox of symbols I had made.  Very similar to this.  Like math, these are all common engineering symbols, but I liked how I had done everything just the way I like it.  The proportions, the spacing, the snap points, etc.  I felt like I had designed my own font.

Yeah, but for this project, I'd like to automate it as much as possible.  I already save all my calculations using the fantastic SpaceTime program on the ipad and Windows.  So after we publish the books in a couple of weeks, I'm going to go back and try to fine tune all the content as far as automation, consistency, styling, database, all that stuff.  This is part of that effort.  We're already done writing everything, so I don't NEED it.  SO I want to take it to the next level and find a more optimum method.  This is what I waste my time with.  I'm sure my partner will think it's a little over the top.  But this is what I do.

Roger. Sounds like at this point it's more of a "how to tackle the revision/next project" type of consideration anyway, so best to wait for completion of the current to fully consider and test.

- Oshyan