[texhax] Interaction with Scientific Word Documents and basic LaTeX questions

[Barbara Beeton]

tom,
thanks for the additional information.

    Thanks very much for the detailed reply.  I also discovered that in
    every paragraph the Scientific Word user applied any edits at all,
    every double space I had placed between sentences is removed,
    requiring me to go back and add them again.  I assume you are already
    familiar with this.  It seems that without the \ operator, SW does not
    permit anything but single spacing between sentences.

i wasn't aware of the sw requirement
to have the extra \ to get wider spaces
between sentences.  i consider this a
misfeature, since it will effectively
double the width of that space when the
file is run through "standard" latex.
to be investigated ...

    I am still uncertain whether my original document was returned to me
    from Scientific Word in portable tex format already, since as you
    describe, there were numerous commented areas and all I needed to do
    for successful compile in TeXnicCenter was to comment out the input
    tcilatex line.  Of course all the formatting tricks I use to improve
    readability like inserting comments between text and footnotes or
    equations was removed.  I will not bother going back to reenter all
    those and will endeavor to do as much of the formatting myself as
    possible.

if the commented areas are clearly code
that is sw-specific, then the file *is*
in "portable latex format".  regarding
the tcilatex line, occasionally a document
will use a command that is defined there,
and one will have to acquire the file and
dig up the definition.  but that's rare,
and commenting out the \usepackage line
almost always works.  (in our experience,
by which i mean "ams production", not
just me.)

good luck.
						-- bb