I've been using LyX for preparing my doctoral dissertation and I'm amazed that such a complete and capable tool isn't more widely known and used. I can't imagine preparing scientific documents now with anything other than LyX, and I can't imagine that I used to use software like MS Word for this purpose. Anyone have any other examples of obscure but amazingly capable software?
I was introduced to LaTeX via LyX as a freshman and found the interface very off-putting and confusing and forgot about the whole thing for years. When I found out I could just type a text file instead, run a few commands, and get the same gorgeous result, it was a revelation and I never went back to OpenOffice.
Probably not news to anyone here, but learning to use a good text editor like vim or emacs is hugely useful and I wish I hadn't waited so long to do it. Git for version control is pretty great too.
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