patoline VS kaobook

Patoline

There is https://patoline.github.io/ but it's been in alpha / active development for years now.

I agree that TeX's errors is one of the worst things about it. Strongly suggest you track your changes in git, I found it was often easier to go back to some version that compiled and re-add the changes, rather than try and track down the missing bracket or extra backslash that broke it.

But try to consider "dirtying your hands with code", maybe LaTeX is not the appropriate tool, but something newer like SILE, Patoline or similar technology may be good for you. Yes, you already said you want something drag and drop, but this other approach.

there was a project but it seems abandoned

https://github.com/patoline/patoline

I would say that it is very close to the kaobook class. Here is the repo. There are docs in the repo, that are written in the kaobook class so take a look and make your own opinion.

I can highly recommend kaobook: https://github.com/fmarotta/kaobook. Currently writing my Master thesis with that.

I really like the kaobook template https://github.com/fmarotta/kaobook

- I find the kaobook class very nice and complete, and the layout seems to open up a lot of options for integrating a lot of visual information, supplementary texts, etc. Has anyone used it, liked it, any other comments or alternatives?

I downloaded kaobook template from https://github.com/fmarotta/kaobook, it used to compile properly with Texlive 2019 and 2020. However when I try to compile using TexLive 2021, sidenote, marginfigure and marginnote insert the text "pt0pt"