General ⇒ LaTeX Editor as part of Microsoft Office

[EthanDavis]

Hi all,

New member of your community here. You may have heard that Windows 10 is coming this year, bringing back the start menu and focusing on desktop improvements for mouse and keyboard users, while at the same time offering one OS that works universally across all devices from phone and tablet to PC, TVs and Xbox. As part of its technical preview program, new builds are being released every week and Microsoft is gathering feedback.

As part of the Windows 10 release, Microsoft is also releasing its free, touch-capable version of Microsoft Office as a universal app that runs on all Windows devices (recently, Microsoft has also released free, touch-capable Office apps for iOS and Android which were very well received!). Having heard about Microsoft Office team gauging interest in a LaTeX editor, I decided to create a suggestion in Microsoft's Uservoice site dedicated to the idea. I think I wrote a convincing case for Microsoft offering a free LaTeX solution that would be able to run on tablets and integrate with its cloud storage (OneDrive) together with an Office Online app. So far, the idea is gathering quite a bit of votes and interest!

Problem is, we're running into some resistance in the comments section from Microsoft Word users who (I presume) don't understand what LaTeX is and why what Word offers is fundamentally different.

I wanted to come to you, who, like myself, truly love LaTeX. I wanted to let you know about the idea, so that you could vote if you believe PC and tablet/mobile device users alike would benefit from a free and accessible, touch/cloud capable LaTeX offering from Microsoft. And also ask your help, I hope, in possibly sharing your thoughts in the idea's comments about why what LaTeX offers is not something that Word can offer (if you agree with me about that!).

Thanks so much for reading, and thank you for your help!
Ethan

[Stefan Kottwitz]

Hi Ethan,

welcome to the forum!

Why choose Microsoft?

• Do they have any capable quick editor with usable GUI as an example?
• They haven't used open standard documents for a long time. Even recently opened formats aren't fully compatible to independent standards.
• Often with a new version the file format changed. Try opening Winword Documents and Word 97 (what was between?) today. Backwards compatibility is a main concern for LaTeX.
• They want to earn money from all, including LaTeX then. How will we users pay it?
• You said across all devices, but you mean Windows devices, not iOS, Android, Linux in dozens of versions, Mac OS X, ... LaTeX editors already run there, if the device is powerful, or OverLeaf and ShareLaTeX could be used.
• Cloud storage? There are a lot, that's a system level, not editor or language related.
• Office online apps? Formerly, you paid once and can use a program for lifetime on your computer. Office 365 and such online things need to be paid each month.
• Can people in all countries afford to buy Microsoft programs?
• Any trade embargo to a country or a "law" could forbid users to use an American commercial LaTeX.
• Is your data safe there?

Stefan

[EthanDavis]

Hi Stefan,

Thanks for your reply! And sorry for a bit of delay. I'll try to address your points to the best of my ability.

Do they have any capable quick editor with usable GUI as an example?

The closest thing Microsoft offers, I believe, is their Visual Studio software for coding Windows apps. However it was just brought to my attention that Microsoft Research has introduced something called Madoko. I don't know much about it, but maybe it has the potential to become the next Microsoft Office app.

They haven't used open standard documents for a long time. Even recently opened formats aren't fully compatible to independent standards.

Often with a new version the file format changed. Try opening Winword Documents and Word 97 (what was between?) today. Backwards compatibility is a main concern for LaTeX.

Agreed! I'm not asking for a new format; I don't think anyone would want that. All I'm asking for a Microsoft Office app that can open, edit, and save .TeX files. An app that, like all the other Microsoft Office apps, works on mobile devices and PC, is touch capable, and integrates with OneDrive/Dropbox.

They want to earn money from all, including LaTeX then. How will we users pay it?

Well, I think Microsoft deserves some more credit here. All Microsoft Office apps are now free. Go to Office.com and check out their nice web apps for yourself. You might have seen in the news that Outlook was just released to iOS/Android devices today -- now the complete Microsoft Office suite is available for FREE from the Apple and Google Play stores and these apps are currently at the top of the charts. And you might have also heard that Windows 10 will be a free upgrade for Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 users. Microsoft actually offers a lot of their products for free nowadays. I think today their goal is just to win back users.

You said across all devices, but you mean Windows devices, not iOS, Android, Linux in dozens of versions, Mac OS X, ... LaTeX editors already run there, if the device is powerful, or OverLeaf and ShareLaTeX could be used.

The nice thing about Windows 10 apps is that one app will run on the desktop PC, phone, tablet, Xbox, Surface Hub, HoloLens, etc... All Windows 10 devices, yes. But what I wanted to point out is that Microsoft doesn't only offer its software exclusively on Windows anymore, even though they try to make Windows the most attractive platform. Nowadays, as I pointed out, you can get Skype, OneDrive, and the entire Microsoft Office for free on your smartphone, whether it's Windows, iOS or Android. If they introduced a LaTeX editor into Office, I expect it would be no different.

As for Overleaf/ShareLaTeX, well, those would fit really well in Office.com. Would be nice if an accessible, easy-to-install native app were available from the app store.

Cloud storage? There are a lot, that's a system level, not editor or language related.

True. Microsoft has been big on this lately. Just a few days ago Outlook gained a "save attachments to OneDrive" option, for instance. You're correct though, that all someone would need to do is download the attachments and manually put them in their cloud storage if they didn't want to use this button.

Office online apps? Formerly, you paid once and can use a program for lifetime on your computer. Office 365 and such online things need to be paid each month.

Nope! Office is not subscription based. Honestly, try it now. You have free access to all Microsoft Office web apps on office.com. Similarly, the mobile touch apps just introduced to the Apple and iOS stores are also completely free installs, not subscription-based.

Can people in all countries afford to buy Microsoft programs?

When it's free, I think a new option from Microsoft would only make LaTeX even more accessible to people in other countries.

Any trade embargo to a country or a "law" could forbid users to use an American commercial LaTeX.

That's true. I think Iran has been blocked from accessing the Windows Store, for instance. But there's not much Microsoft can do about this. This is just a bad US government policy that harms ordinary people more than anything else.

Is your data safe there?

Most definitely. For the first time, a U.S. tech company is taking on the government's demands to access private user data. Microsoft vows to protect its users' data and is only expanding its encryption. Microsoft is even defying federal court orders in its refusal to hand over its customers' data. Google has not been so bold. If you can trust any company with your data, it's Microsoft.

By the way, Microsoft just put out a nice little video about this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxNZRSuuTzg

[Stefan Kottwitz]

Well, Microsoft doesn't make 22 billion dollars net income because of providing free software. Their strategy of winning new users with currently free of charge apps software is aimed to get more money. Crippleware office apps require cloud services subscription for normal functionality. Every kind of device? Where does Windows 10 run today? How well? Well fine if they would offer another LaTeX editor. There's already a lot for Windows.
I don't expect Windows 10 to be a blessing, as I did not for Windows Vista, Windows Phone or Windows 8. We will see what comes after marketing shows. There's a lot of other operating systems.

Stefan

[Johannes_B]

I have to ask, what is it you are loooking for? A mere editor like texstudio (mentioned by you) or a system that compiles the code in the background showing you the output, but not using one of the two main distributions (TeX Live, MikTeX)? So MS would build its own version of TeX?
That is somehow not clear to me. Can you elaborate?

[EthanDavis]

Hi guys, thanks for your replies!

Well, Microsoft doesn't make 22 billion dollars net income because of providing free software. Their strategy of winning new users with currently free of charge apps software is aimed to get more money.

True! But one thing's for sure, they're not making money by harming people. We can both agree that providing quality apps to people (which ARE free, because otherwise they will lose market share to competitors like Google) is not harmful to consumers.

Where does Windows 10 run today?

Microsoft is developing Windows 10 to run on phones, tablets, PCs, Xbox, Surface Hub, smart TVs, their new Hololens technology, and the entire internet of things: everything from your watch to your household thermostat. Touch-capable for devices under 8 inches, and a desktop mode for traditional keyboard and mouse users. They just announced today that Windows 10 will be coming to Raspberry Pi 2, the $35 computer.

One OS that scales to every kind of device. This is not true with other OS manufacturers. Apple has OS X for computers and iOS for their phone and tablets. The same apps do not run on both. With Windows 10 however, developers can write one universal app that will run on any and every kind of device I listed in the previous paragraph. What Windows 10 offers is ambitious and has very high potential.

I have to ask, what is it you are loooking for? A mere editor like texstudio (mentioned by you) or a system that compiles the code in the background showing you the output, but not using one of the two main distributions (TeX Live, MikTeX)? So MS would build its own version of TeX?
That is somehow not clear to me. Can you elaborate?

This is a very good question, and something I struggled with when writing this thread and the Uservoice suggestion I linked to. Honestly, what I'm asking for is a touch-friendly app that is accessible to new users and easy to install. You might have to help me with the details.

I remember several years ago when I first discovered LaTeX for typsetting my work in mathematics (previously, I had used MSWord's equation editor), I was confused why I needed to install both MikTeX and an editor like Texstudio. I'm quite tech-savvy, but I can imagine that for other users, they find LaTeX is even less accessible to them. Futhermore, even if the user tried, none of the current software can be installed to an iPad or other mobile tablet (save for the impressive Surface Pro 3 of course!).

What I envision is the ability of an ordinary student who wants (or needs) to use LaTeX for their math or research paper to go to their app store, click "install" and in only one step, they have a touch-friendly app in which they can edit and compile their project.

The technical details of how to achieve that? You might need to help me. Could one app do all this? Somehow, the web apps Overleaf and ShareLaTeX have managed this, which leads me to believe Microsoft Office apps for Windows, iOS and Android could possibly arrange this as well.

[Johannes_B]

LaTeX, or rather TeX is a typesetting program run via the command line, the very basic interface of a human being and the computer. You are sending a text file to this program. The way you create this textfile is completely up to you. I have used Microsofts Notepad a few times in the past for very basic examples and do it still teaching LaTeX, because this is very basic thing you have to understand.

Notepad doesn't have any fancy stuff as you might know, there is nothing to click nothing to scroll, nothing to bounce. TeX was developed in the 70's and 80's, think about how computers looked like back then.

Over time and with the availability of more powerful computers, people started developing editors with features they don't need, but they wanted. The things i want in an editor are all available with vim (which is around for quite some time as well).

Can you explain what you mean by touch-friendly? This is a thing i am struggeling with, i really can't imagine this in my workflow.

How do online editors achieve this in one step? They don't. They simply save your file and send it to the compiler over and over again.


What i am trying to understand is how you imagine the system. Installing a full TeX Live (providing the typesetting system TeX along with the LaTeX format and many many packages) gives me files of more than a thousand people. Many files still actively maintained, many stable for 20 years. Depending on the kind of document, you need the latest features that get updates regularly. All this updating happens in the background, vi doesn't care about it. It is a text editor. And that is what it does, editing text files.
How would the system you are asking for work?

Btw: can you crosslink this discussion with the feature request?

The guy that came up with a macro package for TeX, Leslie Lamport might be a good authority to ask. He works for Microsoft.

[Johannes_B]

I just noticed, that you also addressed this at the TeX.SX chat room.

Now discussion on that matter is distributed all over the web. People might want to read up on the whole matter, i do at least. Bits and pieces everywhere, i am feeling like a hunter chasing arguments of a discussion.

[anhoavu]

For iOS, check out Texpad.

For Windows 10 [Mobile], you can try LawTeX.

There is no auspice for Microsoft to bring LaTeX to Office: It just doesn't make sense. Typical user wouldn't care while LaTeX users usually don't use Office.