TeX (generally)

TeX (generally)

We are currently using the 2007 TeX Live distribution of TeX and related files. Soon we will transition to the 2010 version of TeX live—see the section below.

You can browse local documentation on TeX Live and its packages by going to /~vojta/tex-doc . Files of particular interest to beginners include:

• The Not So Short Introduction to LaTeX2e—an introduction to the LaTeX language
• LaTeX tips
• Table of Mathematical Symbols

You can also see our old TeX help instead, but be warned that many of these documents refer to LaTeX 2.09 instead of LaTeX 2e, which is installed here and which has been the "modern" version of LaTeX since 1993.

More good starting points for TeX and LaTeX information:

• TeX Users Group Home Page The best online information about TeX. It indexes useful information if you don't know what TeX is, if you want to learn TeX and/or LaTeX, or if you've been using them for years. They also run one of the main sites of the Comprehensive TeX Archive Network.
• TeX Live Home Page.
• LaTeX home page.
• Donald E. Knuth's home page.
• Free math fonts for TeX and LaTeX

Some WikiBooks are also available for TeX:

• LaTeX
• TeX
• TeX for the Impatient

Transition to TeX Live 2010

We will soon switch to using the 2010 version of TeX Live. This version incorporates:

• fuller support for Unicode characters,
• preliminary support for the STIX font set developed by the AMS in collaboration with other major publishers,
• a newer version of LuaTeX (which combines a scripting language with TeX),
• numerous other updates to the standard programs.

The switchover may take place any day now. To check which version of TeX is currently in use, type the command

kpsewhich null.tex

and look for the strings "2007" or "2010".

You can try out the new TeX right now, by typing the following line, once per terminal window:

set path = (/local/depot/4/texlive-2010/bin $path)

If you are using a thin client (or using the thin client server), then this should be changed to:

set path = (/local/depot/texlive-2010/bin $path)

(The above lines assume that you have not changed which shell program you use when logging in.)

Solaris machines will not be able to run TeX Live 2010, because support for Solaris is being phased out.

Please send any questions or concerns to Paul Vojta.

If the switchover to 2010 has taken place already and you are having problems with it, you can go back to the old version of TeX by typing the command

set path = (/local/depot/4/texlive-2007/bin $path)

If you are using a thin client (or using the thin client server), then type the following instead:

set path = (/local/depot/texlive-2007/bin $path)

If this is the case, though be sure to report the problem, since problems cannot be fixed if we don't know about them.

Links

Links to special topics on TeX include:

• Writing your thesis in TeX: the ucbthesis document class
  • ucbthesis readme file (documentation)
  • a sample thesis
  • Preparing your Ph.D. dissertation using LaTeX
  • Preparing your master's thesis using LaTeX
• Writing letters in TeX: the ucbletter document class
• Using TeX to create pdf files
• Spell-checking TeX files
• Installing local macro packages (e.g., ucbthesis or ucbletter) on your machine at home
• Adding Fonts to TeX and Adding Macro Packages to TeX (on the math department network)
• Adding Fonts to XeTeX
• Converting From LaTeX 2.09 to LaTeX 2e

Some Samples

Some TeX samples are available:

		latex	Writing a thesis in LaTeX (same as the above link)
tex and amstex		latex	A sample MetaPost document, with a label
tex	amstex	latex	Using Ralph Smith's Formal Script (rsfs) fonts for nicer script characters
	amstex	latex	Using Cyrillic text
	amstex	latex	Using Cyrillic symbols
		latex	Using Romanian characters
	amstex	latex	Bold Greek letters