LyX (written as LyX in plain text) is a document processor following the self-coined what you see is what you mean paradigm (WYSIWYM), as opposed to the WYSIWYG ideas used by word processors. This mea... More

LyX (written as LyX in plain text) is a document processor following the self-coined what you see is what you mean paradigm (WYSIWYM), as opposed to the WYSIWYG ideas used by word processors. This means that the user only has to care about the structure and content of the text, while the formatting is done by LaTeX, an advanced typesetting system. LyX is designed for authors who want professional output with a minimum of effort and without becoming specialists in typesetting. The job of typesetting is done mostly by the computer, following a predefined set of rules called a style, and not by the author. Specific knowledge of the LaTeX document processing system is not necessary but may improve editing with LyX significantly for specialist purposes.Since LyX largely functions as a front-end to the LaTeX typesetting system, it can handle documents ranging from books, notes, and theses, to articles in refereed journals, letters, and anything else LaTeX can handle. LyX also supports right-to-left languages like Arabic[1], Persian[2], and Hebrew[3], and it has substantial support for bidirectional writing. Prior to 1.5.0, there was a separate release that supported Chinese, Japanese and Korean languages, but these have been incorporated into LyX since then.Although LyX is popular among technical authors and scientists for its advanced mathematical modes, it is increasingly used by social scientists and humanists for its excellent bibliographic database integration and ability to manage multiple files. LyX has become especially popular among self-publishers, including even novelists, because LyX combines the ease of use of a word processor with the typesetting abilities of LaTeX.The LyX document processor is available for various operating systems, including UNIX, Mac OS X, OS/2, Windows, and Linux. LyX can be redistributed and modified under the terms of the GNU General Public License and is thus Free Software.  [edit]  Less