LaTeX is a powerful document preparation system that is particularly valuable for anyone who needs to typeset mathematics. Furthermore, virtually all conferences and journals in computing science and engineering provide style files that automatically ensure that your document adheres to the particular formating required by each venue. I could keep heaping praise on Latex, but instead, here are some helpful resources to assist you in exercising the power of latex for yourself:
- Hypertext Help with LaTeX [HTML]
Definitions, descriptions, and examples of virtually every latex command and environment.
- Using Imported Graphics in LaTeX 2e [PS] [2.2 MB]
Or, as I like to call it, the ultimate guide to LaTeX figures. The most useful chapter is Chapter IV, where you'll find examples of all sorts off side-by-side figures and sub-figures.
- The tablularx package [PDF] [183 KB]
The tabularx package provides the tabularx environment, that replaces the tabular environment. Tabularx provides table columns that will automatically resize independently of the width of the content in the column. This is handy when you want two columns to be the same width, or you have long text that should span multiple lines of a narrower column. If you're frustrated by tabular, try tabularx. (Note: column sizing is done using an iterative method, and can be much slower than using a normal tabular environment. Only use tabularx if you actually need it.)
- fixbb [shell script]
This bash script will analyze eps figures and recalculate their bounding box. The bounding box is used by LaTeX as the "real size" of the image, so a larger-than-necessary bounding box can lead to excess blank space around figures in your document. Unfortunately, most programs don't set the bounding box quite right. In particular, if you use gnuplot to make eps graphs, and change use the 'set size' option to change the aspect ratio of the graph, the aspect ratio of the bounding box is not changed.
Every command line argument is assumed to be an eps file to process.
Typical Usage: $ ./fixbb *.eps
Note: You may have to 'chmod +r fixbb' to make the script executable
- Skeleton Makefile
[makefile]
This makefile will run the required passes on your document, and produce a ps and a pdf version of the document. Note that this makefile assumes you are using bibtex to produce a bibliography.
- LaTeX Guide [HTML]
This is the overview of LaTeX presented in previous years.
