LyX wiki | FAQ / Pronunciation

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And how are those weird names pronounced?

Table of contents (hide)

1. TeX
2. LaTeX
3. LyX

§1. TeX

The FAQ of the TeX User Group (TUG) says:

The 'X' is "really" the Greek letter Chi, and is pronounced by English-speakers either a bit like the 'ch' in the Scots word 'loch' ([x] in the IPA) or like 'k'. It definitely is not pronounced 'ks' (the Greek letter with that sound doesn't look remotely like the Latin alphabet 'X').

§2. LaTeX

The FAQ of the TeX User Group (TUG) says:

Lamport never recommended how one should pronounce LaTeX, but a lot of people pronounce it 'Lay TeX', 'Lay Tech' or perhaps 'Lah TeX' (with TeX pronounced as the program itself; see the rules for TeX). It is definitely not to be pronounced in the same way as the rubber-tree gum.
The 'epsilon' in 'LaTeX2e' is supposed to be suggestive of a small improvement over the old LaTeX 2.09. Nevertheless, most people pronounce the name as 'LaTeX-two-ee'.

§3. LyX

As you can see in this thread and this one, there's no real consensus. Proposals from the developers include:

[liks] to rhyme with "Weetabix" (John)
"try to make the 'eeeee' sound a bit more like 'yyyyy' [...] You english speaking cretins are not able to hear the difference between 'LyX' and 'Licks'" (Lars).
"L�ks with short � (that is in IPA). I've heard "Liks" with short "i", too." (Andr�)

Proposals from users include:

Since it's written in C++, home of the dangling memory pointer, maybe "leaks"? (Paul)

Some consensus is:

The 'X' is (not) pronounced as a Chi as in TeX and LaTeX.
It's not pronounced "Throatwobbler Mangrove".

The "official truth", according to the Wikipedia:

LyX was original going to be named Lyrix; so
most likely it should be pronounced like the English word "licks".

Conclusion:

"Find something you are comfortable with and use that." (Lars)

Threads where this was discussed:

FAQ

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