Wow, I love this idea! This should be a part of Google Apps for sure. Hm, but how should I tell Google? :-)

im expecting your source code, very eagerly:-)

WoooW, I'm an IT tech in a research center and your soft will suit me well

This is a very good idea indeed!! It already looks really good, thanks a lot!

As already mentioned it would be amazing as part of Google Apps, or inside Google Docs. I actually wrote a comment in Google Groups, see http://groups.google.com/group/Suggestions-and-Ideas-Writely/browse_thread/thread/2051a6e2919dd487# .

Anyway, thanks a lot, I can't wait! :-)

Yeah! That would be a great feature for Google-Docs and Google-Apps. It would make those Google Tools useable for more scientific papers. In conjunction with the sharing documents capabilities ... WoOoWoOoW!

Google or not, there is a lot of demand for a LaTeX based and web-based word processor.

In the mean time, there is already a working project called ScribTex?, a free collaborative LaTeX editor. http://www.scribtex.com/

Please continue with this great work. I look forward to using it with my colleagues in the sciences. Best of luck to you.

It would be very nice if you can include it in google wave. I imagine people writing scientific papers and teachers doing exercises with students.

This app is going to be great!

Is there any way to test it?

Thank you very much in advance.

Integration in Wave - had just the same idea some time ago

This app is going to be great! Is there any way to test it? Thank you very much in advance.

I want to tested it also how do I compile it ?

Hi. My name is Pedro and I am student at Cambridge University. I would like to test it? How could I proceed, please. Best wishes. See you.

I would love to be a Beta tester as well. I'm a physics student at UC - Santa Barbara.

Great !

I like to be a beta tester of your project. I am really interested on it. Please let me know if I can help you in order to test your software.

Please let me know if you need help or testing. This is going to be the best thing since sliced bread

Error message below. ----

! Font C70/mj/m/n/12/d5=uwmjd5 at 12.0pt not loadable: Metric (TFM) file not fo
und.

I want to use Koean with CJK package. How can i resolve that problem.

This is a fabulous idea. I'm already using it with firefox 3.6.2 and I will tell you id I find any bugs. So far so good.

Thanks!! And I really hope it is a part of google docs, very soon.

I would also like to help with the beta testing. I am a mathematician at the University of California, San Diego. I'm very excited about this feature!

I have been waiting for this for a long time. I would like to help with the beta testing. How can I get the software?

very interested in this. would love to help

This is a great project. Two questions: -who exactly is able to see my documents? Google (presumably trusted)... anyone else? A breakdown of where the files is almost vital to convincing people that they should do professional work here. Is there/will there be encryption?

-is there any hope for implementing auctex-like inline preview?

This is a great project. Congratulations and Thank you.

Alejandro, LaTeX Lab uses the GData API to access Google Docs, using secure AuthSub? for authentication. When you allow LaTeX Lab to access your Google Docs account, the application receives a token from Google which it can use to interact with your Google Documents. Each request to Google Docs needs to be signed with a cert, to ensure authenticity.

LaTeX Lab itself doesn't store any documents, just the user token. The token gets revoked and cleared when you sign out of LaTeX Lab. The LaTeX server is a separate and dedicated environment. When compiling a document, the contents are sent to the LaTeX server. The LaTeX server keeps a temporary cache of documents. For example, when editing a document that references 10 images, the LaTeX server may cache the 10 images temporarily to avoid downloading those 10 resources with each compile request.

This cache is the only place where documents may temporarily live outside Google Docs. I understand that users may not want sensitive documents to be cached on some server. This is the reason why LaTeX Lab allows users to use a private LaTeX environment, such as your University's LaTeX server. There will also be a local compile option available which eliminates this problem altogether.

That being said, the current setup for LaTeX Lab is likely more secure than other online LaTeX editors available, because of the complete separation between the server that hosts your documents (Google Docs) and the server that processes your documents, which, coupled with the cert based authentication of each read/write request that Google Docs imposes and the local/private LaTeX compiler options, make the app very secure. The exception is that HTTPS isn't currently available, since the Google AppEngine? doesn't currently support it - this will change however by the time LaTeX Lab moves out of the preview stage.

Bobby, thanks for the explanation, that bothered me also.

More specifically, do I grant LaTeX Lab read access to all my google docs documents, or selected docs only ? I would not like to give the application access to all my docs, only the ones I intend to but it seems to work the other way. Am I right ?

Wojsyl, currently the GData token is good for accessing all text documents on your Google Docs account (no spreadsheets), this has to do with how AuthSub? and the GData API function. I'm looking for ways to reduce the scope of the token. For now, if this is a concern, consider using a separate Google account with LaTeX Lab.

The concept of a custom web-based Google Docs editor is very new. The design choices we're discussing here will influence how other similar editors are built.

Great project!!!!! Go on.

What should I do if I want to get CJK support?

Hey Bobby... contact me so we can chat about integration into Docs!

Does this include access to MetaPost?? I assume that you are using a LaTex? release based on Lua enabled LaTex?. Is this correct?

Excellent work!! I recall submitting requests to Google for latex integration from way back when... been hoping to see this for quite a while! thank you, you've just made the lives of many math/science researchers and grad students so much easier! Keep up the good work!

A promising project.

As a hint, try to get in contact with the Scientific Journals to establish a cooperation with them. They provide you with apropriate LaTeX templates and inital preamble documents, users can selecet based on the journal and publication type only, and they recommend their authors to use LaTeX Lab for preparing, editing and reviewing the preview and print ready versions of their scientific publication.

This requires that the LaTeX error messages are not only listed in the status line but are highligted at least in the source text as far as possible to get Biologists and other non Tech people to use the editor too.

A dumy question, i have never used Google Docs, does Google Docs provide something like track changes or document versioning and showing changes at least in a readable way within the source text? This would be a mandatory feature to get a broader range of users beyond the typical LaTeX users.

Xris

Awesome project. Where do I donate?

How can i build my own CLSI Server?

Great idea. This is an exciting and much-needed project. Looking forward to working on my manuscripts at home and work, without the need for flash drives etc.

Great Idea. Excellent. Looks promising. I am going to try writing my thesis on this.

Great Great Idea!! Thnks

Fantastic idea and great work!!

I hope that in the future you guys will add the collaborative tools from google docs to this project.

Again, excellent job guys.

This is amazing. I hope to contribute to this project some day. Thank you very much.

This is great. You should really think about adding it to the Chrome Web-app store once it is done!

This is nice, but I have one suggestion. In order to make latexlab useful as a collaborative tool, changes by one author need to appear somehow distinct from others.

In open office and MSWord, this is done by the "track changes" feature. In standard googledocs this can be done by inserting comments (which appear in a colored box ).

I would use latexlab if it were easy to, for example, assign each collaborator a different color of text. (not in the compiled document - just in the source code). Maybe simply import the "insert comment" feature of google docs.

Excellent work!! I'm glad to see Latex Lab developing! However, compiling seems to be very slow... is it a traffic issue or something else? If compiling was faster, I would SO switch permanently to Latex Lab!! :)

solid bit of work. really happy that you made this.

At the moment, latexlab.org comes within the definition of a malicious site: it requests your googledocs password as a latex editor, you open your tex files, and then you have them irreversibly spoiled (with no empty lines between paragraphs) without even clicking "save" (due to autosave).

I am far from underestimating the amount and difficulty of work that the developers face, and neither do I repost a previously known bug at a wrong place, but potentially harmful issues of latexlab should be explicitly mentioned on the home page, so that general public would not become a victim of its alpha-testing.

Great! thank you but it seems that it is hard to find the tutorial or "how to" part.

This is unbelievably wonderful. Seems like a dream :) Congrats.

Really great. That's what I was missing: using my LaTeX templates in google docs....

Solid and amazing. You could be onto a winner with this one

Congrats. Extremely useful, and creative. I could have used your application to create my Math Thesis, a LOT EASIER, a few years back!

So happy someone's working on this. Would absolutely be willing to give a small donation if it was quick and easy! Is this a kickstarter?

The reviewers of my techical documents do not read LaTeX sources, and they should not have to learn, just to make comments. Currently the review process is compile to PDF, email the PDF, collect email comments, and make edits to the sources, compile and repeat.

Email and PDF are cumbersome. Comments cannot be entered directly into the PDF doc, in context. Reviewers cannot easily see each others' comments without massive CC spam.

So I was looking for a way to compile my LaTeX sources into a Google Docs rich-text document, so that reviewers who could comment on the "rendered" Google Doc using the built-in features. I'd still want to edit the LaTeX sources, upload a new GDoc for the next round of review.

This isn't quite the solution I was looking for. But could it be?

This projects needs more funding and contributers, I am definitely going to help out somehow.. By using it of course :D

This is the first time in probably 10 years that I closed the window with saving first, and didn't see any warning. A few hours' work is completely lost - what else more do I need to say? I am spoiled by nice product like google docs.