3 ms·
> For academic publications almost no one uses Microsoft Word except for a small minority. Sure, we're all biased by our own experiences, but I've found this t
by 3JPLW 13y ago
> For academic publications almost no one uses Microsoft Word except for a small minority.
Sure, we're all biased by our own experiences, but I've found this to be blatantly false in the biological sciences. Microsoft Word dominates, if only for its comment and change tracking and ease-of-use.
I'd love to use latex, but very few of my collaborators even know the syntax. I think latex predominantly rules in physics, math, and perhaps some engineering fields (but certainly not BME). Definitely not all of academia.
(As an aside, I have a hard time not pronouncing the name as Authorrhea).
- apepe 13y agogreat point about MS Word use.. see my other comment. And yeah our name is prone to explosive jokes... :)
- aroch 13y agoI can also attest to the biological sciences reliance on Word and Track Changes. It's maddening at times but then again my 80 year old PI (whose in the lab everyday doing wet work still!) can use it and every computer on our campus (some 1000 or so) can be used to edit our drafts . I and some of my other colleagues would much rather move into something like Google Docs and we've done so to a limited extent. I wish someone had told me about Authorea a month ago before I started another manuscript in Word. I'm happy to take the hour and my PI is happy to spend the hour for me to show him how to use other editing and collaboration tools. I just need to know about them!
- jimmar 13y agoThis is also true in management science. Some top journals require Word submissions (to my dismay). Word works okay with limited authors & citations, but our research lab ran into a ton of problems when we had 10+ collaborators working on a single document with hundreds of citations. It would have been no problem with source control and Latex.