LaTeX or Word for Research Paper

LaTeX is almost necessary for something like a thesis paper, but for an ordinary 10-page research paper, Word should suffice and be easier.

 

If you know your way around LaTeX, it's easy to format the document for standard 1" margins or whatever your instructor requires. I used LaTeX for most papers in my senior year without much problem.

How many sources will have? If you already have a BibTeX database and know how to do LaTeX bibliographies, then it makes sense to use LaTeX. If you don't have the time to learn that, though, I'd recommend using Word.

Of course, stuff typeset with LaTeX looks really nice so I encourage people to use it whenever they can

 

Consider OpenOffice or NeoOffice. Both are free and give you the equivalent of MS Word plus it includes a database to use as bibliography source.

Depending on your needs, Mellel is a powerful academic word processor. Combine it with Bookends (seamlessly) and you have a winning combination.

Nisus Writer Pro works well.

 

Pages would basically be the same as using Word, but Pages doesn't have auto-save backups! Given that TextEdit has auto-save eek, you'd think Pages would get up to speed. That said, one time when writing in Word 2004 with auto-save turned on, I ran into an artificial memory error which prevented me from saving the paper. Nothing is safe apparently .

OpenOffice has always been kludgy to me, but I haven't used their bibliography database. It's not to hard to pick up LaTeX... I learned all the essentials over the course of a week.

If you still have worries about formatting, just ask your instructor... say "the font will be a little different and the text will be justified, but your eyes will thank you afterwards!"

 

Pages, Word, or OpenOffice should all be fine for an ordinary 10 page research paper.

I use Pages myself.

If you have the time, LaTeX is alway worth learning, though.

 

What's the general subject of the paper you have to write?

A compromise between a Word-like application and latex would be lyx.

 

Fair enough -- Best of luck, then.

I do think that it would be a good idea to give LaTeX a try sometime, when you're not under a deadline.

 

Ha ha! More likely you'll have to write about the lack of metrication in the US. The only things I can think of that are widely accepted are (1) 2-liter soft drink bottles, (2) pharmacy (such as 100mg aspirin), and (3) the concepts common to electrical engineering (volts/amps/watts etc). Even other areas of engineering (esp. mechanical, aerospace) are a mess and still use a mix of SI and English units. I think NASA lost a Mars probe a few years ago due to an SI/English conversion snafu.

Anyways, you should be fine in Word for such a report.