I am using this in a simple containerized environment https://github.com/patrickziegler/letter (for reducing the amount of packages to update in my rolling release base system), it comes with the the added benefit of allowing me to put my documents under proper version control :)
I think LaTeX set out to be a decent typesetter (in the sense if the profession) for books.
With human typesetting already becoming a rare profession LaTeX turned out to be the better typesetter for almost everyone in the 90s. Also InDesign came along and fulfilled that promise well for the other half of the market that had money but no inclination to work the WYSIWYM way. This lead to LaTeX' big success in the academic world.
I think typst can't hold a candle to any of the two when it comes to the previous flagship
discipline of setting narrow columns of fully justified and hyphenated[1] text utilizing microtypography to equalize the grey value.
I do not know what the plans for typst are, but I think it will
have a niche even if it will
never come to par with LaTeX and InDesign.
Their capabilities are a thing for old style physical books and not even for what we call books now.
Full justification is as dead as narrow columns and hyphenation. 30 years of web changed our reading habits. What we think of books now is mostly meant to be readable on a screen.
I also think scientific papers should adapt to that fact. Of course without throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Being able to share papers as self-contained files is a big plus and high quality math typesetting is a must.
Columnar and fully justified serif text on the other hand is just baggage.
If typst can be the accessible tool for scientific publication that'd be fantastic. If it gains enough legacy features to
replace LaTeX completely even better.
[1] Especially when it comes to languages with long words and complicated hyphenation rules like German.
P.S. Unironically always enjoyed TeX and LaTeX. Enjoy typst too, just not as a full (La)TeX replacement (yet).
What about my of decades worth of snippets, custom commands, templates for all the journals, my bib files, and of course my published works that I borrow pieces from? I should replace that with something nonfree that I have to learn from scratch? Howabout you do you?
You're right, people submitting for academic publications will still need to use LaTeX until those institutions change their practices.
If that group comprises the vast majority of people who might have a use for a programmatic typesetting environment, and if the use of LaTeX by academic institutions represents current, expert insight about LaTeX's continued superiority and not simply organizational inertia, then Typst is irrelevant and pointless.
Long term user of LaTeX. I did try Typst and it has is advantages main one it compiles faster. I am sticking with LaTeX and I don't find it difficult to use, write packages and classes, as I did invest the time to understand it and learn the language. Academic institutions, understand its superiority and also want to protect their archives. Maths has a long shelf-life. LaTeX also has a very good civilized community. LaTeX as it stands now has no comparative competitor.
Does typst support the standard Tex math notation? I understand that a lot of effort went into doing math different - and probably better - than Tex, but I'm just very used to the Tex notation.
It doesn't, which IMO was a stupid decision. TeX math notation isn't even that bad, and making Typst compatible with it would've gone a long way towards adoption. It's currently unusable for me because in order to actually use it for something I need to first find time to re-learn everything.
Do you think it is sufficiently respectful of TeX/LaTeX?
As far as proponents go, I will echo the sentiments of many people who have actually used both TeX and Typst: I have been able to accomplish many things in Typst within an hour or two by writing my own Typst code, that in LaTeX I could only accomplish after several days by cargo-culting indecipherable gibberish from years-old forum posts. I freely admit Typst can't (yet) match LaTeX's long-tail package ecosystem, but it is much more pleasant to use and easier to reason about.
I posted that link here earlier last month[0] and even I think the comment was off putting because it's off topic and just a way to put something down. "The link you posted is becoming increasingly irrelevant" doesn't seem to add much to the conversation. To the extent that it does add something (ie. comparison of typst and Tex/LaTex) it could be phrased very differently. The way it is written now also invites similarly phrased criticism the other way as seen in other replies. I agree typst is much more pleasant to write. Also yes I doubt the typst developers would call LaTex irrelevant. In fact the author specifically points out ways the Tex currently outperforms typst. (Not to imply you stated otherwise.)
>in LaTeX I could only accomplish after several days by cargo-culting indecipherable gibberish from years-old forum posts
To learn basic use of LaTeX, takes an afternoon. To understand the language fully takes "effortful learning" like any other programming language.
I believe the difference is that Typst is effectively a scripting language, not much different than many popular ones like Javascript and Python. If you already known the basics of some programming languages this allows you transfer them very easily and start writing your own scripts very quickly. You also don't need to fully understand the language to do this, the basics will mostly be enough.
In comparison Latex has a very particular way of doing computations that you will have to learn from scratch, and even then it won't be as easy or intuitive. The fact that Latex relies so much on packages for many things also means that you will have to learn their details and intricacies when trying to do interoperate with them, which makes this even more complex.
I'm ignorant of Typst. But you're missing an important problem with Latex. Packages are really fragile. The most important property of a programming language is compositionality, and Latex has so little of that that I'm generally afraid of picking up packages because I've wasted so many hours trying to get them to play nice.
I still use Latex because of the output quality and the sunk cost..but we can clearly do better
Strict to the extent that they actually expect latex, not just something that looks like latex. So unless typst is willing to output latex, which they are not, it will never work.
no the depth of graphics API's in latex is really something, and an area that is underdeveloped in typst. it'll take a considerable time for typst to be on par.
The compiler is FOSS under a permissive license Apache 2.0). Only the online editor, similar to Overleaf, is not Open Source. Please check the facts before hitting reply.
yes, it does and its realtime.
personally, I use typst locally, but
the online editor utilises WASM, so if I'm not mistaken, the rendering is real-time and handled by the front-end.
no, I pointed towards the joy of writing in a proper IDE.
but to your point: overleaf is a key enabler of latex and its cool to see typst offers a similar route
I am using this in a simple containerized environment https://github.com/patrickziegler/letter (for reducing the amount of packages to update in my rolling release base system), it comes with the the added benefit of allowing me to put my documents under proper version control :)
With nothing against this particular hoster, why not link the official site https://tug.org/texlive, or https://tug.org/texlive/acquire.html?
At the time the blog post was written, the .torrent file was not yet posted to tug.org.
Slightly offtopic, is there anything for Windows/Linux like the BasicTex.pkg for Mac? https://www.tug.org/mactex/morepackages.html
There's TinyTeX: https://yihui.org/tinytex/
the masochism of latex is becoming increasingly irrelevant with every typst [1] release.
no going back once you experience realtime rendering of your document, and support in VS Code is stellar IMO.
[1] http://typst.app
I think LaTeX set out to be a decent typesetter (in the sense if the profession) for books. With human typesetting already becoming a rare profession LaTeX turned out to be the better typesetter for almost everyone in the 90s. Also InDesign came along and fulfilled that promise well for the other half of the market that had money but no inclination to work the WYSIWYM way. This lead to LaTeX' big success in the academic world.
I think typst can't hold a candle to any of the two when it comes to the previous flagship discipline of setting narrow columns of fully justified and hyphenated[1] text utilizing microtypography to equalize the grey value.
I do not know what the plans for typst are, but I think it will have a niche even if it will never come to par with LaTeX and InDesign.
Their capabilities are a thing for old style physical books and not even for what we call books now. Full justification is as dead as narrow columns and hyphenation. 30 years of web changed our reading habits. What we think of books now is mostly meant to be readable on a screen.
I also think scientific papers should adapt to that fact. Of course without throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Being able to share papers as self-contained files is a big plus and high quality math typesetting is a must. Columnar and fully justified serif text on the other hand is just baggage.
If typst can be the accessible tool for scientific publication that'd be fantastic. If it gains enough legacy features to replace LaTeX completely even better.
[1] Especially when it comes to languages with long words and complicated hyphenation rules like German.
P.S. Unironically always enjoyed TeX and LaTeX. Enjoy typst too, just not as a full (La)TeX replacement (yet).
It’s not really though. I haven’t heard it mentioned once in my academic contacts and involvement and we write a lot of LaTeX.
I'm not arguing the relevance of latex, but merely underscore the joy of wielding that particular tool
Your point was the irrelevance of LaTeX which has the momentum of a neutron star.
in usage yes, in terms of active development its a very different story
Most of it is done and really none of us using it want a moving target.
Not everybody loves moving targets.
I'm betting on LaTeX significantly outlasting both Typst and VS Code, per the Lindy effect.
What about my of decades worth of snippets, custom commands, templates for all the journals, my bib files, and of course my published works that I borrow pieces from? I should replace that with something nonfree that I have to learn from scratch? Howabout you do you?
What do you mean, nonfree? The compiler is Apache 2.0 licensed.
The page wanted me to sign up for a free account for some service, so I perhaps unfairly assumed it’s non free.
typst `bibliography` function accepts .bib files
Which major (applied) math/statistics journal accept submissions in typst？
You're right, people submitting for academic publications will still need to use LaTeX until those institutions change their practices.
If that group comprises the vast majority of people who might have a use for a programmatic typesetting environment, and if the use of LaTeX by academic institutions represents current, expert insight about LaTeX's continued superiority and not simply organizational inertia, then Typst is irrelevant and pointless.
Big "if"s, though.
Long term user of LaTeX. I did try Typst and it has is advantages main one it compiles faster. I am sticking with LaTeX and I don't find it difficult to use, write packages and classes, as I did invest the time to understand it and learn the language. Academic institutions, understand its superiority and also want to protect their archives. Maths has a long shelf-life. LaTeX also has a very good civilized community. LaTeX as it stands now has no comparative competitor.
Does typst support the standard Tex math notation? I understand that a lot of effort went into doing math different - and probably better - than Tex, but I'm just very used to the Tex notation.
It doesn't, which IMO was a stupid decision. TeX math notation isn't even that bad, and making Typst compatible with it would've gone a long way towards adoption. It's currently unusable for me because in order to actually use it for something I need to first find time to re-learn everything.
Back on my day, we already had real-time rendering of LateX on Solaris workstations used by our professors on the computing department.
So it isn't like that is something widely impressive.
Typst may have its pros and momentum (I haven't tried it myself yet), but I find this attitude and language used by its proponents very offputting.
I've only heard Knuth and Lamport speak respectfully about the technologies that came before tex and latex.
What do you think of this post by Typst's primary contributor? https://laurmaedje.github.io/posts/layout-models/
Do you think it is sufficiently respectful of TeX/LaTeX?
As far as proponents go, I will echo the sentiments of many people who have actually used both TeX and Typst: I have been able to accomplish many things in Typst within an hour or two by writing my own Typst code, that in LaTeX I could only accomplish after several days by cargo-culting indecipherable gibberish from years-old forum posts. I freely admit Typst can't (yet) match LaTeX's long-tail package ecosystem, but it is much more pleasant to use and easier to reason about.
I posted that link here earlier last month[0] and even I think the comment was off putting because it's off topic and just a way to put something down. "The link you posted is becoming increasingly irrelevant" doesn't seem to add much to the conversation. To the extent that it does add something (ie. comparison of typst and Tex/LaTex) it could be phrased very differently. The way it is written now also invites similarly phrased criticism the other way as seen in other replies. I agree typst is much more pleasant to write. Also yes I doubt the typst developers would call LaTex irrelevant. In fact the author specifically points out ways the Tex currently outperforms typst. (Not to imply you stated otherwise.)
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43032697
>in LaTeX I could only accomplish after several days by cargo-culting indecipherable gibberish from years-old forum posts To learn basic use of LaTeX, takes an afternoon. To understand the language fully takes "effortful learning" like any other programming language.
I believe the difference is that Typst is effectively a scripting language, not much different than many popular ones like Javascript and Python. If you already known the basics of some programming languages this allows you transfer them very easily and start writing your own scripts very quickly. You also don't need to fully understand the language to do this, the basics will mostly be enough.
In comparison Latex has a very particular way of doing computations that you will have to learn from scratch, and even then it won't be as easy or intuitive. The fact that Latex relies so much on packages for many things also means that you will have to learn their details and intricacies when trying to do interoperate with them, which makes this even more complex.
I'm ignorant of Typst. But you're missing an important problem with Latex. Packages are really fragile. The most important property of a programming language is compositionality, and Latex has so little of that that I'm generally afraid of picking up packages because I've wasted so many hours trying to get them to play nice.
I still use Latex because of the output quality and the sunk cost..but we can clearly do better
Is it easy to port latex templates ? I see this as a big one, since conferences/ journals have very strict formatting requirements.
Strict to the extent that they actually expect latex, not just something that looks like latex. So unless typst is willing to output latex, which they are not, it will never work.
Does it support pgf & tikz ?
no the depth of graphics API's in latex is really something, and an area that is underdeveloped in typst. it'll take a considerable time for typst to be on par.
Slightly unrelated question: anyone knows of a proper (with an example document) comparison between LaTeX, Typst and SILE? Maybe ConTeXt too?
> the masochism of latex
better than
> sign up for free
enshitification
The compiler is FOSS under a permissive license Apache 2.0). Only the online editor, similar to Overleaf, is not Open Source. Please check the facts before hitting reply.
Writing in the browser, seriously?
Typst is available as a standalone compiler
With realtime results?
yes, it does and its realtime. personally, I use typst locally, but the online editor utilises WASM, so if I'm not mistaken, the rendering is real-time and handled by the front-end.
You are talking about incremental compilation?
no, I pointed towards the joy of writing in a proper IDE. but to your point: overleaf is a key enabler of latex and its cool to see typst offers a similar route