I'm trying to identify good practices and advice for students starting to write their PhD dissertations, and I cannot clearly recommend a "best" software to use. I used LaTeX for my own thesis and I was very happy with it, but my supervisors had to review a PDF of the text since they were not comfortable with raw text files.
On the other hand, MS Word is widely used I guess, and provides a very convenient set of tools for comment reviews, but it can be a real pain when the document increases in size (although the use of a master document and sub-files per chapter may be a reasonable solution).
What is your choice, as a student or as a supervisor ?
Certainly latex with a good tex editor, like TexStudio. I have also used TeXnicCenter, but TexStudio is by far a better and free solution too.
By using latex you have your work ready for publication in best journals and it will not need to 'texify it', when you will decide to knock their doors.
MS Word is a commercial and expensive product (MS Office cost 150 euros before some years and after crisis and all similar things it still costs 139 euros - student edition!).
I do not recomend it, except if you are a rich man.
But you can use LibreOffice which :1)is the same 2)is free of charge.
Certainly latex with a good tex editor, like TexStudio. I have also used TeXnicCenter, but TexStudio is by far a better and free solution too.
By using latex you have your work ready for publication in best journals and it will not need to 'texify it', when you will decide to knock their doors.
MS Word is a commercial and expensive product (MS Office cost 150 euros before some years and after crisis and all similar things it still costs 139 euros - student edition!).
I do not recomend it, except if you are a rich man.
But you can use LibreOffice which :1)is the same 2)is free of charge.
Certainly it is best to use Latex. The name speak for itself. No further remarks need to be added.
Latex is more adapted for scientific and engineering types of theses. It enables the user to solve problems related to positioning and precise formatting of tables, figures, and equations. This would be quite laborious with MS Word.
If your thesis is in the social sciences or humanities in general, then I do not see anything wrong with using MS Word, it is perfectly adapted for writing a thesis. You may need to learn some tricks as to how to manage a large document. Using Latex for a social science thesis may not be required, since most of the thesis work is text.
During last few years I did many of my drafts in Google docs. I find the advantages of online tools awesome. Usually, I finalize the work with Latex.
Let me add that reviewing PDF is no longer trouble. If I'm not wrong, there is a way to add comments in Acrobat. Sometimes it should be an obligation to supervisors not to modify the student's manuscript...
I always ask my students to send PDF versions of their manuscripts, as I usually read them in PDFExpert on the iPad. This allows to add comments and notes, which can be typed or handwritten. So my student's use of LaTeX is not a problem. On the contrary, I do recommend it.
We've been using MS word, while hating every minute that we work with it. Formatting is an absolute pain, and typesetting is far from ideal. LaTex is a good option, but I don't think it is the best when the manuscript has many figures (i.e. ChemDraws).
Most times I work with Apple Pages (the 5.3 version, the new version is horse manure), but it has some limitations, the biggest for me being the absence of cross-citations. In Mac environment Ulysses is a great piece of writing software that could probably streamline the writing phase, although I'd probably use another software for the final typesetting)... Also in Mac, check out Scrivener.. it's also good for organizing stuff...
I like Michal Kolar suggestion of using google docs because the possibility of live editing, which helps with the problem of having a common version in which everyone is working...
I guess that, at the end of the day, is to a very high degree a matter of taste.
I gave my supervisors in Pdf. But, I never knew there are other and better softwares to use. Thank you for the question.
LaTeX is perhaps the best to write mathematical matters, but then one has to know how to use this software! In fact, some journals demand that articles must be typed in LaTeX! That puts some of the authors in problem perhaps!
In my eyes, simplicity to use is also a required quality. I consider, MS Word is the simplest of all available text writing software simply because it is easy to use.
I think that we have to make a distinction between 'math sciences' and 'social sciences': For the first category latex is requirement. For the second category, I suggest using LibreOffice Writer, which is absolutely free and 100% compatible with MS Word. Besides this, there exists a TexMaths equation editor where you can put latex formatted equations and other things, if you like to combine the simplicity of a word editor with the nice output of latex, see the pi and pi[1] at the attachment.
To explain my simple answer a bit: I supervised more than 50 Theses (BA, MA, etc.), and wrote several monographs myself. As soon as you have to write "masses for text", have to manage references, etc. - over the last decade, LaTeX proved the best tool for this. Word (and comparable) usually causes problems with layout, references, aging and corrupt files. So if you really have to write something important, use LaTeX and a version control system. LaTeX generates plain text files, which you can access in 10 years from now - try this with a word file ;) This is what worked for me, and that's why I strongly recommend using LaTeX.
I think you can use MS word. You may switch on Trackchange options when you read your students thesis. Similarly you may ask your students to switch on trackchange option when they start revising upon your correction. This may reduce your reading time and effort.
LaTeX ! Word is just a mess to write a PhD thesis. Your supervisor should learn LaTeX ;)
For commenting on the thesis, one can use adobe's tools (or foxit reader) to comment, highlight and write in the text. It works as in Word.
LaTeX, I'd say. However, it isn't that easy to get what you want, i.e. you should read instructions way before you start writing something critical for your needs. LyX? well, must be refined... Actually I am using Pages.app together with BibDesk, and as a second chance LyX and BibDesk. I tried everything else (Mellel, Word, LibreOffice, Nisus), but this is the best compromise for me.
If this is just a question of tools, for Mac, you can use TeXnicle (http://www.bobsoft-mac.de/texnicle/texnicle.html), or - my preferred way - TeXShop (http://pages.uoregon.edu/koch/texshop/), which is simple, easy to use, FAST ;), etc. For Windows, you can find comparable tools...
Better to use sharedLaTeX (https://www.sharelatex.com/) for collaborative work instead of Lyx.
MS word and I will share with you my videos
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhDJ8wuTHdLyOshdCQr_Kh2N8eP4Dh0Ug
Perhaps you could try some of the online services, such as google docs or overleaf. These make a great difference for reviewing, since you don't have to keep track of THE LAST VERSION, which is always in an undefined place.
https://www.overleaf.com
Ulysses III or Scrivener are the great programs, too. Choosing between them isn't easy, though, but I prefer Ulysses.
Try out SciFlow, it'll let you focus on writing and will fit your document to your publisher/university's needs.
https://www.sciflow.net
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