The weird part is that most modern office software has version control built right in.
And I still do this with all my files anyway.
LPT Do it.
Submitted 5 months ago by fossilesque@mander.xyz to science_memes@mander.xyz
https://mander.xyz/pictrs/image/d783c8ef-3839-475f-9040-4629568fa385.jpeg
Comments
MudMan@fedia.io 5 months ago
otter@lemmy.ca 5 months ago
I’ve had the built in version control do unexpected things, so I play it safe and create named backup files. I usually end up using that one file, but I’ve been saved on occasion
Steve@startrek.website 5 months ago
Its just not trustworthy
BearOfaTime@lemm.ee 5 months ago
Use date/time in your file name,using GMT:
Metrics of Sales 2024-05-22_14-29.docx
Very unlikely to have 2 docs with the same down-to-the-minute time stamp in the name.
MudMan@fedia.io 5 months ago
If you think this process involves enough mindpower to check the time, let alone figure out where the dashes are in whatever language keyboard setup I'm using at the time, you are wildly overestimating how much care goes into doing this.
mortrek@lemmy.ml 5 months ago
I generally do this on my NAS, combined with nightly and bi-weekly backups, plus a 6-mo safety backup, to a backup drive. Also, basic off-site nightly backups for important stuff. If I worked on really important stuff that required lots of versioning, though, I’d probably go with a versioning system instead of inserting the date.
Turun@feddit.de 5 months ago
git tag “FINAL FINAL FINAL DEAFT - v20”lowleveldata@programming.dev 5 months ago
Git is like shit for Word documents
Tolookah@discuss.tchncs.de 5 months ago
But better for LaTeX
drre@feddit.de 5 months ago
and then there are fucking PIs insisting on word files who never heard of tracked charges let alone of file naming conventions.
jeena@jemmy.jeena.net 5 months ago
That’s why we wrote out thesis in LaTeX: github.com/jonte/GGS-report/blob/…/report.lyx#L36…
programmer_belch@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 months ago
I also have my reports in latex inside a git repo, complete with a makefile to generate graphs from csv containing simulation results. However I am too ashamed to publish the entire version control to a public repo
user224@lemmy.sdf.org 5 months ago
#LyX 2.0 created this file. For more info see www.lyx.org
Wait, I thought you guys did it manually…
Anyway, I should still learn it.
vzq@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 months ago
Unzip the docx with a pre-commit hook
(This is not a serious suggestion)
dream_weasel@sh.itjust.works 5 months ago
Just like word documents are shit for papers and theses/dissertations it turns out. The formatting alone is a nightmare.
steventhedev@lemmy.world 5 months ago
.gitattributes can invoke Word on windows to diff versions, and there are plenty of open source scripts that can do it if you don’t have a copy of Word (or Windows) lying around.
But Word is like shit for papers. Use LaTeX instead.
Hundun@beehaw.org 5 months ago
Why on Earth would you curse yourself with MS Office anyway, especially if writing docs is your professional responsibility?
Why not use Git+Markdown+Pandoc, have your copy, data and layout separate?
I understand that a lot of istitutions/companies impose stylistic/technical requirements for docs and publications, - still doesn’t matter you gotta stay married to the worst tooling.
lowleveldata@programming.dev 5 months ago
Why on Earth would you curse yourself with MS Office anyway
idk it says
.docxin OP’s imagefossilesque@mander.xyz 5 months ago
This is the way.
titey@jlai.lu 5 months ago
This is the way.
Opafi@feddit.de 5 months ago
Still better than using file names.
notthebees@reddthat.com 5 months ago
I should write my resume in LaTeX.
CorvidCawder@sh.itjust.works 5 months ago
Done it and highly recommend it
prashanthvsdvn@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Do you have a good LaTeX template for it. I did make a data driven based LaTeX pdf for my resume but it’s a nightmare when applying for jobs these days, since they have that ATS parser nonsense, which will throw the entire resume down if it isn’t as very plain and boring word document without much formatting.
magnor@lemmy.magnor.ovh 5 months ago
Wait there are other ways to write a resume?
prashanthvsdvn@lemmy.world 5 months ago
I know it’s a long video but you have no idea what’s possible.
PlexSheep@infosec.pub 5 months ago
HTML. Some it people have their CV on their personal website.
v_krishna@lemmy.ml 5 months ago
Haha my first thought seeing this meme is “do you want to start writing LaTeX by hand? Because this is how you start…”
urda@lebowski.social 5 months ago
I have it is so worth it. I then use GitHub / GitLab releases to “release” a built PDF for my reference.
bl_r@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 months ago
I wrote mine in LaTeX, highly recommend.
I mean, I spent years writing LaTeX for school so it was real simple and mindless. YMMV
Vorticity@lemmy.world 5 months ago
I do this using overleaf. It’s been much easier to maintain and update since switching.
TrickDacy@lemmy.world 5 months ago
I have enjoyed switching mine to HTML format which I then generate a PDF from. The only downside is that different browsers can render stuff slightly different, but that’s normally fixable with one line css change. And it’s not like I need to update my resume constantly on different machines.
ulterno@lemmy.kde.social 5 months ago
I was on Word, then LibreOffice Writer.
Now thinking of making it a markdown source, with CSS styling to get an HTML based PDF. This way, the same source can be used on a webpage with different generation code.
jol@discuss.tchncs.de 5 months ago
I learned LaTeX just so I could effectively use git in it.
lud@lemm.ee 5 months ago
I kinda want to learn LaTeX but I rarely write anything and I hate doing it so won’t have much use for it. It’s pretty neat though.
I also saw that there was a way to use LaTex to generate PowerPoint which seems extremely useful because PowerPoint is extremely annoying to use.
jol@discuss.tchncs.de 5 months ago
Yes, I also mde my. Thesis slides in LaTeX which was nice as I coukd reuse the figures.
IrritableOcelot@beehaw.org 5 months ago
I mean yes you can use beamer to make slides, but it is a lot less flexible than ppt/LibreOffice Present.
sandalbucket@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Had to write a paper in college with 100 citations.
We used zotero for citation management, and it would dump a bibtex file on demand.
The paper was written in markdown, stored in git, and rendered through pandoc. We would cite a paper with parentheses and something resembling an id, like (lewis).
We gave pandoc a “citation style definition”, and it took care of everything. Every citation was perfectly formatted. The bibliography was perfectly formatted. Inline references were perfect. Numbering was perfect. All the metadata was ripped from pdfs automatically. It was downright magical.
TheChargedCreeper864@lemmy.ml 5 months ago
This is what I (a non coder who only knows git “download the Yuzu repo before they nuke it” and git “give me all the updates”) want to do when I get to write a paper. How much git did you have to learn to do this?
prashanthvsdvn@lemmy.world 5 months ago
This is just basic make changes to file, git add and commit workflow. Other features of git like branching can be leveraged for greater control but are optional. What makes it magical is 3 seperate systems working together with such symphony namely git, Zotero and pandoc. Zotero is citation manager that you can use store scientific articles, papers, thesis etc. and it can produce a bibliography file and pandoc can reference those along with the citations in the make file to create a clean typesetted Word or LaTeX pdf with precise numbering, table of contents, citations and bibliography with correct format without you needing to edit anything.
hinterlufer@lemmy.world 5 months ago
yep, markdown is a great alternative to LaTeX if you don’t need fancy layouts or anything special
sandalbucket@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Markdown + pandoc means it goes through an intermediary latex template on the way to pdf land - which means your markdown can be a bastardized mix of markdown, html, latex commands, and sometimes more ;)
Waterdoc@lemmy.ca 5 months ago
Exactly my workflow, but I used R Markdown!
sandalbucket@lemmy.world 5 months ago
I absolutely love R markdown! Being able to iterate on your analysis and report at the same time is fantastic
qjkxbmwvz@startrek.website 5 months ago
I also added a Makefile for mine (LaTeX), and it would add the commit hash to the front page (with an asterisk if the repository had uncommitted changes).
So, if I gave a draft to someone and got feedback, I’d know exactly which revision it was.
GarlicToast@programming.dev 5 months ago
This is brilliant
flango@lemmy.eco.br 5 months ago
Hey, amazing idea, can you share the code?
qjkxbmwvz@startrek.website 5 months ago
Makefile in other comments. You’ll need something like this on the title page (this assumes you use my Makefile which puts the version in
VERSION.tex[that’s the literal name of the file, not a placeholder]):{\bf{\color{red}DOCUMENT REVISION:}} {\color{blue}\input{VERSION}}qjkxbmwvz@startrek.website 5 months ago
Sure thing. This also includes the beamer bit which I used for my defense. It’s all pretty hacky but hope it’s useful!
# # Errors aren't handled gracefully (tex doesn't write to stderr, it seems) # If you encounter errors, use "make verbose" # # For small changes (probably those without references), use "make quick" # # Thanks to https://gist.github.com/Miliox/4035649 for dependency outline TEX = pdflatex BTEX = biber MAKE = make -s TEXFLAGS = -halt-on-error # $(MAIN).log is dumb if we have multiple targets! SILENT = > /dev/null || cat $(MAIN).log SILENT_NOER = 2>/dev/null 1>/dev/null EDITOR = vim -p PDFVIEW = evince MAIN = main PRES = presentation ALL = $(MAIN).pdf RECURS = media/ manuscripts/ VERSION := $(shell git rev-parse --short HEAD | cut -c 1-4)$(shell git diff-index --quiet HEAD && (echo -n ' ';git log -1 --format=[%cd]) || (echo -n '* '; date -u '+[%c]')) all: recurs $(ALL) pres: $(PRES).pdf scratch: scratch.pdf scratch.pdf: scratch.tex @echo "TEX (final) $<" @$(TEX) $(TEXFLAGS) $< $(SILENT) verbose: SILENT = '' verbose: $(ALL) recurs: $(RECURS) @$(foreach DIR, $(RECURS), \ echo "MAKE (CD) $(CURDIR)/$(DIR)"; \ $(MAKE) -C $(DIR) $(MAKECMDGOALS);) @echo "MAKE (CD) ./" clean: @echo "SH (RM) Not recursing; 'make allclean' to clear generated files." @rm -f *.aux *.log *.out *.pdf *.bbl *.blg *.toc *.lof *.lot *.bcf *.run.xml allclean: recurs @echo "SH (RM) A clean directory is a happy directory" @rm -f *.aux *.log *.out *.pdf *.bbl *.blg *.toc *.lof *.lot *.bcf *.run.xml version: @echo "SH (ver) $(VERSION)" @echo $(VERSION) > VERSION.tex nixpages: main.pdf @echo "PDF (pdftk)" @pdftk main.pdf cat 1 4-end output final.pdf quick: $(MAIN).tex version @echo "TEX (final) $<" @$(TEX) $(TEXFLAGS) $< $(SILENT) $(MAIN).pdf: $(MAIN).tex $(MAIN).bbl all.tex tex/abstract.tex tex/intro.tex tex/appendix.tex tex/some_section.tex tex/some_other_section.tex @echo "TEX (draft) $<" @$(TEX) $(TEXFLAGS) --draftmode $< $(SILENT) @echo "TEX (final) $<" @$(TEX) $(TEXFLAGS) $< $(SILENT) $(MAIN).bbl: $(MAIN).aux @echo "BIB (bib) $(MAIN)" @$(BTEX) $(MAIN) > /dev/null $(MAIN).aux: $(MAIN).tex $(MAIN).bib version @echo "TEX (draft) $<" @$(TEX) $(TEXFLAGS) --draftmode $< $(SILENT) $(PRES).pdf: $(PRES).tex $(PRES).bbl tex/beamer*.tex tex/slides/*.tex @echo "TEX (draft) $<" @$(TEX) $(TEXFLAGS) --draftmode $< $(SILENT) @echo "TEX (final) $<" @$(TEX) $(TEXFLAGS) $< $(SILENT) $(PRES).bbl: $(PRES).aux @echo "BIB (bib) $(PRES)" @$(BTEX) $(PRES) > /dev/null $(PRES).aux: $(PRES).tex $(MAIN).bib @echo "TEX (draft) $<" @$(TEX) $(TEXFLAGS) --draftmode $< $(SILENT) edit: @echo "EDIT (fork) $(EDITOR)" @$(EDITOR) ./tex/*.tex *.tex view: @echo "VIEW (fork) $(PDFVIEW)" @$(PDFVIEW) $(ALL) $(SILENT_NOER) &
CCF_100@sh.itjust.works 5 months ago
docx files are actually zip archives with xml in them
petersr@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Let me tell you something. I cannot tell you what company, but I have been tasked with putting Excel files in git “because they are just zip archives with xml” and it is just a disaster. Everytime you save the document it will save certain parts of the xml code in arbitrary ways (like each image is in a list and the order Og that list is random everytime), some metadata is re-written everytime like time of last modified and finally all the xml files are one single line. The git diffs are complete useless and noisy and just looking at the Excel file will cause git to consider it updated. So sure, you can use git to snapshot you Office documents… But just don’t.
lengau@midwest.social 5 months ago
If you are, like I once was, the poor fool who has to maintain a bunch of VBA macros… Extract them into files and source control those. Make a script to extract them and to put them back, and use git-lfs for the actual workbook if you need a template workbook.
Now pardon me, I need to add this to the agenda for my next therapy.
oce@jlai.lu 5 months ago
Just fork git to handle zipping, formatting and ignoring metadata! Or just put your office document in the cloud and use the basic versioning it provides.
MacNCheezus@lemmy.today 5 months ago
Doesn’t matter, to git they are still binary files, which means it’ll check in each revision as an entirely new copy.
Zagorath@aussie.zone 5 months ago
Someone could probably build a tool which sits in between you and Git, which unzips the file before committing and after pulling, so Git sees the raw xml file, but you always see the zipped docx.
JackbyDev@programming.dev 5 months ago
Which isn’t any different than keeping them as separate files space wise so what’s the problem?
(Other than Word having built-in versioning.)
uis@lemm.ee 5 months ago
I think you can write clean/smudge filter that will turn docx into tree(folder)
SeattleRain@lemmy.world 5 months ago
What’s a good way to learn about Latex and Git. I’ve tried learning on my own but it’s very overwhelming.
Waterdoc@lemmy.ca 5 months ago
I wrote about half of my thesis in R Markdown using Git to backup my work. It’s fantastic because you can have your plots and statistics integrated directly into your paper and formatting in Markdown is much easier than straight up latex.
justme@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 months ago
I recently read a tutorial titled: “how to annoy your collaborators: a git CI pipeline for LaTeX” ;)
thebardingreen@lemmy.starlightkel.xyz 5 months ago
I encountered an engineering firm that did this. I wanted to do it too.
The company I worked for at the time (said engineering firm was doing subcontracting for us) was full of older business people who could never in a million years have wrapped their heads around the idea.
ryannathans@aussie.zone 5 months ago
Don’t put binary files in git
TheReturnOfPEB@reddthat.com 5 months ago
“Click I want to delete this repository” ate my homework.
atyaz@hexbear.net 5 months ago
Latex and git ❤️
model_tar_gz@lemmy.world 5 months ago
git checkout -b final_version_revised2_REALLYFINALTHISTIME git commit -am “holy fuck I hope this really is the last edit” git push
ArmokGoB@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 months ago
I wrote my thesis in Google Docs on my university account.
orwellianlocksmith@lemmy.world 5 months ago
I’m dumb, can someone explain this joke to me? Wtf is a git repo?
Vorticity@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Okay, I have a question. I would love to write my papers in latex, but none of my colleges use it. Is there a way to reasonably collaborate with coauthors who only use Word and for whom Latex would be confusing and difficult?
marcos@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Don’t you automatically put everything relevant you create in a version control system? And if not, why?
There’s no thinking involved on it. Create repo; run editor. The sequence is automatic.
friend_of_satan@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Between zfs and git, all my important data is versioned.
hakunawazo@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Shameless self reference:
perviouslyiner@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Forth panel from Mark Pilgrim:
- Writing a programming book that typesets your sample code into the book and also runs it to update the sample output shown in the book.
veganpizza69@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Don’t forget to push
ornery_chemist@mander.xyz 5 months ago
Counterpoint: advisor said no to latex.
“Just use Word, everyone else does. I have never heard of this latex thing, so must be just some trendy useless overengineered software that does Word’s job but worse. Word can track changes just fine, and you can leave comments.” proceeds to strikethrough, hughlight, and inline comment everything instead of using either of those features “I want to read what you wrote, not fight technology” proceeds to email you three separate times after forgetting to attach v28 about how a graphic looks wrong because Word ate it
pufferfisherpowder@lemmy.world 5 months ago
While correct in the sense of word and versioning via mail being a nightmare, I really don’t think you can expect anyone to learn latex just so they can edit in your document. I would have offered to send a pdf. Shoot me.
Zagorath@aussie.zone 5 months ago
I would have never considered doing anything but sending a PDF. Even if they do know LaTeX. Unless they’re offering to help edit the code for me, what good is it? It’s objectively harder to read than the formatted PDF.
That said, marking up a PDF is much more difficult and does require more specialised software and know-how than editing plain text or even editing a Word document. So there are some advantages to it.
7bicycles@hexbear.net 5 months ago
galaxy-brain: don’t even talk to your advisors, just hand in a finished PDF
Randelung@lemmy.world 5 months ago
you can still use word with git. it’s versioning first, diffing and merging only where possible. since you probably won’t branch you won’t need the latter, though.
ornery_chemist@mander.xyz 5 months ago
Preaching to the choir. “But Box already supports ‘versioning’, why use a confusing hacker tool instead?”
droans@lemmy.world 5 months ago
Missing diffs is a problem, though.
I don’t get how Microsoft owns GitHub yet hasn’t figured out any way to actually create a spec that would be git compatible for Excel, Word, and PowerPoint files yet.
What_Religion_R_They@hexbear.net 5 months ago
wait, your advisor looks at your work?
ornery_chemist@mander.xyz 5 months ago
Dude was a micromanaging gatekeeper. My dissertation is still embargoed because he is paranoid about being scooped. Joke’s on him, everything that hasn’t been published everything is not exciting enough to meet his own metric for publishability.
fushuan@lemm.ee 5 months ago
I did this and I had no issues with any of the thesises I have submitted in my bachelors or masters.
First year calculus teacher, thank you SO much for forcing us to write submissions in latex.
Also, overleaf is a thing, this is not like my 1st year of uni, this 11 years later or so. If your fucking professor never heard of latex they are just bad at academia and shouldn’t be teaching honestly. It’s not just about the field knowledge.
Hagdos@lemmy.world 5 months ago
I do this, but from Word.
I learned Latex for my master thesis. Never used it again afterwards, except for my resumé.
WhatIsH2O4@lemmy.ml 5 months ago
That’s assuming they are competent enough to even use a PDF.