General ⇒ LaTeX vs. Paper for original Work

[Northstar]

I'm returning to theoretical physics after an absence of many years. Back then original creative work was most often done with pencil and paper, then transcribed with the crude computer tools available at the time for distribution & publication. I'm wondering if LaTex and LaTex editors are now sufficiently capable that people working in theoretical fields such as math, physics, chemistry, engineering etc. can do their original work directly on a PC with it and skip the paper and pencil stage altogether. Does it help or hinder such an approach? How do you do your original creative work? Are there other tools better suited to the creative stage of theoretical work?

I've been working in programming for many years where of course all original creative work is done directly at the keyboard. So I can't help but wonder (and hope that) the more abstract theory areas do likewise now days and that the tools like LaTex are up to it.

[Stefan Kottwitz]

I usually developed on the computer, using LaTeX, when studied mathematics.

• Imagine an very formula term to be transformed step-by-step, or a very complex equation to be solved. Using LaTeX, I copy&paste for the next step and make a small change, and repeat that. With paper and pencil, I would have to write the whole formula again, with modification, do it again and again.
• A mistake? No problem, it can be edited, no need to rewrite all by hand.
• It looks great already during writing, which is motivating.
• At the end I already got the result. No need to transcribe handwritten notes to TeX.

No waste of paper. I keep all copies, I can electronically search within. I have it on my iPad and can have it on my phone. Together with all the written notes of years. Which I could use again, as a template or a start for a similar paper.

Stefan

[localghost]

As a supplement to Stefan's remarks I suggest to give Gummi a try. It is a simple LaTeX editor which compiles your document automatically every time it detects that you stopped typing on the keyboard (for a configurable amount of time). This way you can see what you did so far almost instantly (provided that your code is free of errors).


Thorsten