The LaTeX logo, typeset with LaTeX

L^AT_EX, written as LaTeX in plain text, is a document preparation system for the T_EX typesetting program. Image File history File links LaTeX_logo. ... Image File history File links LaTeX_logo. ... A word processor (also more formally known as a document preparation system) is a computer application used for the production (including composition, editing, formatting, and possibly printing) of any sort of viewable or printed material. ... TeX (IPA: as in Greek, often in English; sometimes written TEX in imitation of the logo) is a typesetting system created by Donald Knuth. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ...

It is widely used by mathematicians, scientists, and engineers, in academia and commercially, and by others as a primary or intermediate format (e.g. translating DocBook and other XML-based formats to PDF) due to the quality of typesetting achievable by TeX. It offers programmable desktop publishing features and extensive facilities for automating most aspects of typesetting and desktop publishing, including numbering and cross-referencing, tables and figures, page layout and bibliographies. Plato is credited with the inception of academia: the body of knowledge, its development and transmission across generations. ... DocBook is a markup language for technical documentation, originally intended for authoring technical documents related to computer hardware and software but which can be used for any other sort of documentation. ... The Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a W3C-recommended general-purpose markup language for creating special-purpose markup languages, capable of describing many different kinds of data. ... PDF is an abbreviation with several meanings: Portable Document Format Post-doctoral fellowship Probability density function There also is an electronic design automation company named PDF Solutions. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... TeX (IPA: as in Greek, often in English; sometimes written TEX in imitation of the logo) is a typesetting system created by Donald Knuth. ... Apple Pages being used with one of the free templates Desktop publishing (also known as DTP) combines a personal computer and page layout software to create publication documents on a computer for either large scale publishing or small scale local economical multifunction peripheral output and distribution. ... Bibliographies at the University Library of Graz Bibliography (from Greek βιβλιογραφία, lit. ...

LaTeX is intended to provide a high-level language to access the power of TeX. LaTeX is essentially comprised of a collection of TeX macros, and a program to process LaTeX documents. Since TeX's formatting commands are very low-level, it is usually much simpler for end-users to use LaTeX.

LaTeX was originally written in 1984 by Leslie Lamport at SRI International and has become the dominant method for using TeX—few people write in plain TeX anymore. The current version is (LaTeX2e). LaTeX, like TeX, is free software. 1984 (MCMLXXXIV) was a leap year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Leslie Lamport Dr. Leslie Lamport (born 1941) is an American computer scientist. ... SRI Internationals main campus on Ravenswood Avenue, Menlo Park, California SRI International is one of the worlds largest contract research institutions. ... This article is about free software as defined by the sociopolitical free software movement; for information on software distributed without charge, see freeware. ...

The typesetting system

PDF document typeset using LaTeX.

LaTeX is based on the idea that authors should be able to focus on the meaning of what they are writing, without being distracted by the visual presentation of the information. In preparing a LaTeX document, the author specifies the logical structure using familiar concepts such as chapter, section, table, figure, etc., and lets the LaTeX system worry about the presentation of these structures. It therefore encourages the separation of layout from content, while still allowing manual typesetting adjustments where needed. This is similar to the mechanism by which many word processors allow styles to be defined globally for an entire document, or the CSS mechanism used by HTML. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (976x694, 123 KB) Summary Screenshot of a PDF document typeset with LaTeX displayed in Apples Preview on OS X v10. ... Image File history File links Download high resolution version (976x694, 123 KB) Summary Screenshot of a PDF document typeset with LaTeX displayed in Apples Preview on OS X v10. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... A word processor (also more formally known as a document preparation system) is a computer application used for the production (including composition, editing, formatting, and possibly printing) of any sort of viewable or printed material. ... In computing, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is a stylesheet language used to describe the presentation of a document written in a markup language. ... // One difference in the latest HTML specifications lies in the distinction between the SGML-based specification and the XML-based specification. ...

LaTeX can be arbitrarily extended by using the underlying macro language to develop custom formats. Such macros are often collected into packages which are available to address special formatting issues such as complicated mathematical content or graphics. In addition, there are numerous commercial implementations of the entire TeX system, including LaTeX, to which vendors may add extra features like additional typefaces and telephone support. LyX is a free visual document processor that uses LaTeX for a back-end. TeXmacs is a free, WYSIWYG editor with similar functionalities as LaTeX, but a different typesetting engine. Macro (meaning large or wide) is also applied to macroeconomics, and macroscopic or macro lenses. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... (written as LyX in plain text) is a document processor following the self-coined what you see is what you mean paradigm (WYSIWYM), as opposed to the WYSIWYG ideas used by word processors. ... This article is about free software as defined by the sociopolitical free software movement; for information on software distributed without charge, see freeware. ... TeXmacs on Fedora Core 2 GNU TeXmacs is a free scientific word processor, which was both inspired by TeX and GNU Emacs. ... This article is about free software as defined by the sociopolitical free software movement; for information on software distributed without charge, see freeware. ...

A number of popular commercial desktop publishing systems use modified versions of the original TeX typesetting engine. The recent rise in popularity of XML systems and the demand for large-scale batch production of publication-quality typesetting from such sources has seen a steady increase in the use of LaTeX. The Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a W3C-recommended general-purpose markup language for creating special-purpose markup languages, capable of describing many different kinds of data. ... Batch production is used to produce or process any product in groups that are called batches, as opposed to a continuous production process, or a one-time production. ...

The example below shows the LaTeX input:

 documentclass[12pt]{article} title{LaTeX} date{} begin{document} maketitle LaTeX{} is a document preparation system for the TeX{} typesetting program. It offers programmable desktop publishing features and extensive facilities for automating most aspects of typesetting and desktop publishing, including numbering and cross-referencing, tables and figures, page layout, bibliographies, and much more. LaTeX{} was originally written in 1984 by Leslie Lamport and has become the dominant method for using TeX; few people write in plain TeX{} anymore. The current version is LaTeXe. newline % This is a comment, it is not shown in the final output. % The following shows a little of the typesetting power of LaTeX begin{eqnarray} E &=& mc^2  m &=& frac{m_0}{sqrt{1-frac{v^2}{c^2}}} end{eqnarray} end{document} 

This input would produce the following LaTeX output:

Image File history File links LaTeX_Output. ...

Example from Online LaTeX.

Pronouncing and writing "LaTeX"

LaTeX is usually pronounced [ˈleɪ.tɛk] or [ˈlɑ.tɛk] in English (that is, not with the [ks] pronunciation English speakers normally associate with X, but with a voiceless velar plosive like the first sound of "kit"). The last character in the name comes from a capital χ (chi), as the name of TeX derives from the Greek τέχνη (skill, art, technique); for this reason, TeX's creator Donald Knuth promotes a /tɛx/ pronunciation (that is, with a voiceless velar fricative as in Modern Greek, or the last sound of Scottish "loch" or German "Bach"). Lamport, on the other hand, has said he does not favor or discourage any pronunciation for LaTeX. The voiceless velar plosive is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages. ... Chi (upper case Χ, lower case χ) is the 22nd letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Donald Knuth at a reception for the Open Content Alliance. ... The voiceless velar fricative is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. ...

The name is traditionally printed with the special typographical logo shown on this page. In media where the logo cannot be precisely reproduced in running text, the word is typically given the unique capitalization LaTeX to avoid confusion with the word “latex”. The LaTeX logo, typeset with LaTeX , written as LaTeX in plain text, is a document preparation system for the (TeX) typesetting program. ...

Implementations, distributions, and licensing

LaTeX is typically distributed along with plain TeX, and same considerations apply to its implementations: LaTeX is available on operating systems including Linux, Unix, Windows, and Mac OS X, and in fact, two different implementations are typically available on each system: one that outputs a DVI file, and another based on pdftex, which outputs an Adobe Acrobat PDF file. The default font is Knuth's Computer Modern, which gives most documents created with LaTeX the same distinctive look and feel as those created with plain TeX. A number of TeX/LaTeX distributions are available, including TexLive (multiplatform), teTeX (unix), fpTeX, MiKTeX (Windows), CMacTeX, and OzTex (Macintosh). TeX (IPA: as in Greek, often in English; sometimes written TEX in imitation of the logo) is a typesetting system created by Donald Knuth. ... Linux (also known as GNU/Linux) is a Unix-like computer operating system. ... Unix (officially trademarked as UNIX) is a computer operating system originally developed in the 1960s and 1970s by a group of AT&T employees at Bell Labs including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, and Douglas McIlroy. ... Microsoft Windows is the name of several families of operating systems by Microsoft. ... Mac OS X (official IPA pronunciation: ) is a line of proprietary, graphical operating systems developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Computer, the latest of which is pre-loaded on all currently shipping Macintosh computers. ... DVI (DeVice Independent) is the output file format of the TeX typesetting program, designed by Donald Knuth in 1979. ... pdfTeX is a variant of the TeX typesetting program originally written by Hàn Thể Thành. ... Adobe Acrobat was the first software to support Adobe Systems Portable Document Format (PDF). ... Sample text in Computer Modern Computer Modern is the family of typefaces used by default by the typesetting program TeX. It was created by Donald Knuth with his METAFONT program, and was most recently updated in 1992. ... The TeX mascot, by Duane Bibby TEX, written as TeX in plain text, is a typesetting system written by Donald Knuth. ... The TeX mascot, by Duane Bibby TEX, written as TeX in plain text, is a typesetting system written by Donald Knuth. ...

LaTeX is distributed under a free software license, the LaTeX Project Public License (LPPL). The LPPL is not compatible with the GNU General Public License, as it requires that modified files also modify the actual physical file names; this was done to ensure that files that depend on other files will produce the expected behavior and avoid dependency hell. A new version of the LPPL that will be compatible with the GPL is in the works. The LPPL is DFSG compliant since its version 1.3. Free software is software which grants recipients the freedom to modify and redistribute the software. ... The LaTeX Project Public License is a software license originally written for the LaTeX system. ... The GNU logo The GNU General Public License (GNU GPL or simply GPL) is a widely used free software license, originally written by Richard Stallman for the GNU project. ... Dependency hell is a colloquial term for the frustration of some software users who have installed software packages which have dependencies on specific versions of other software packages. ... The Debian Free Software Guidelines (DFSG) are a set of guidelines that the Debian Project uses to determine whether a software license is free software license, which in turn is used to determine whether a piece of software can be included in the main, free software distribution of Debian. ...

Editors and IDEs

There are many editors and IDEs available. An integrated development environment (IDE), also known as integrated design environment and integrated debugging environment, is a type of computer software that assists computer programmers in developing software. ...

• AUCTeX: an extensible package for writing and formatting TeX/LaTeX files in GNU Emacs and XEmacs
• BaKoMa TeX: Commercial realtime/synchronous LaTeX editor
• Euphoria (software): IDE designed for authors of large documents (homepage)
• iTeXMac: A free front end for Mac OS X, with editor and output window
• Kile: IDE designed mainly for KDE
• LaTeXiT: a free front end of Mac OS X
• LEd: A free environment for rapid TeX/LaTeX document development under MS Windows
• LyX: WYSIWYM (What you see is what you mean) IDE
• PCTeX: Commercial LaTeX system for Windows (homepage)
• Ribbit: Shareware front end for MS Windows with Microsoft Word integration (homepage)
• Texmaker: Free cross-platform LaTeX editor. Runs on Windows, Mac OS X and Unix (GNU/Linux binary). Is released under the GPL license
• TeXnicCenter: IDE designed for MS Windows users under GPL
• TeXShop: A free front end for Mac OS X, with editor and output window
• The Vim LaTeX suite (homepage)
• WinEdt: Shareware IDE for Windows 9x/NT4.0/2000/XP
• WinShell: Freeware IDE for Windows 9x/NT4.0/2000/XP

AUCTEX is an extensible package for writing and formatting TeX files in GNU Emacs and XEmacs. ... GNU Emacs is one of the two most popular versions of Emacs (see also XEmacs). ... XEmacs running under Fedora Core 2 XEmacs is a text editor derived from GNU Emacs. ... BaKoMa TeX is a complete TeX implementation for Microsoft Windows XP/2000/NT/98/95 with Visual (True WYSIWYG) LaTeX Editor, PostScript enabled graphical engine and support for using scalable font formats such as OpenType, TrueType, and PostScript Type 1 Font. ... Mac OS X (official IPA pronunciation: ) is a line of proprietary, graphical operating systems developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Computer, the latest of which is pre-loaded on all currently shipping Macintosh computers. ... Kile is a user friendly TeX/LaTeX editor similar to WinEdt. ... KDE (K Desktop Environment) (IPA: ) is a free desktop environment and development platform built with Trolltechs Qt toolkit. ... Mac OS X (official IPA pronunciation: ) is a line of proprietary, graphical operating systems developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Computer, the latest of which is pre-loaded on all currently shipping Macintosh computers. ... External links LEd Category: TeX ... (written as LyX in plain text) is a document processor following the self-coined what you see is what you mean paradigm (WYSIWYM), as opposed to the WYSIWYG ideas used by word processors. ... WYSIWYM is an alternative to WYSIWYG. The acronym refers to slightly different things depending on the context of use. ... Frogs are amphibians in the Order Anura, which includes frogs and toads. ... Microsoft Word, or Microsoft Office Word, is Microsofts flagship word processing software. ... Texmaker is an cross-platform open source LaTeX editor. ... TeXnicCenter is a free open source program, IDE for LaTeX in Windows, using the MiKTeX or TeXLive distributions. ... TeXShop is an open source, freeware TeX editor and previewer for the Mac OS X platform. ... Mac OS X (official IPA pronunciation: ) is a line of proprietary, graphical operating systems developed, marketed, and sold by Apple Computer, the latest of which is pre-loaded on all currently shipping Macintosh computers. ... Vim, which stands for Vi IMproved, is an open-source, multiplatform text editor extended from vi. ... WinEdt is a shareware ASCII editor and shell for Microsoft Windows. ... WinShell is a free multilingual software application for LaTeX and TeX for Windows developed by Ingo H. de Boer. ...

Tools and packages

• Beamer (LaTeX): Create sophisticated, structured presentations and slides using LaTeX.
• LaTeX2RTF: Translator program which is intended to convert a LaTeX document into the RTF format.

Beamer is the name of a LaTeX class for creating presentations. ... LaTeX2RTF GUI LaTeX2RTF is a translator program which is intended to convert a LaTeX document into the RTF format which can be imported by several text processors (including Microsoft Word and OpenOffice. ...

External links

Wikibooks has a book on the topic of

LaTeX

Free software Portal

Image File history File links Wikibooks-logo-en. ... Wikibooks logo Wikibooks, previously called Wikimedia Free Textbook Project and Wikimedia-Textbooks, is part of the Wikimedia Foundation. ... Image File history File links Portal. ...

Tutorials

• The Not So Short Introduction to LaTeX2e, or LaTeX2e in 139 minutes (2.21 MiB PDF file).
• LaTeX installation and user guide (HTML)
• LaTeX for Complete Novices (HTML)
• LaTeX for Beginners (HTML)
• LaTeX for the nontechnical user
• LaTeX Tutorials: a Primer (pdf)
• LaTeX Primer (HTML) Getting Started with LaTeX, with a particular focus on typesetting mathematics.
• Tutorials in LaTeX (HTML) Free manual distributed by the India TeX Users Group (TUG).
• Getting to Grips with LaTeX (HTML) Collection of LaTeX tutorials taking you from the very basics towards more advanced topics.
• LaTeX resources (HTML) A collection of tutorials and other resources from the University of Cambridge.
• Making Friends with LaTeX
• Really Simple LaTeX. Bare-bones introduction to LaTeX.
• Using BibTeX with LaTeX (HTML) An introduction of how to add bibliographies to LaTeX documents.
• Formatting Information: a Beginner's Introduction to Typesetting with LaTeX (html, pdf).
• Principles of LaTeX Formatting: A conceptual orientation to LaTeX.
• The AMS Short Math Guide for LaTeX A concise summary of math formula typesetting features (PDF file).

A mebibyte (a contraction of mega binary byte) is a unit of information or computer storage, abbreviated MiB. 1 MiB = 220 bytes = 1,048,576 bytes = 1,024 kibibytes The mebibyte is closely related to the megabyte (MB), which can either be a synonym for mebibyte, or refer to 106... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...

Books

• Mittelbach, Frank, and Goossens, Michel (2004). The LaTeX Companion, Second Edition. Addison-Wesley. ISBN 0-201-36299-6.. The Companion is an excellent resource for intermediate to advanced LaTeX users. For those already somewhat familiar with LaTeX, this is probably the single most useful available book on the subject. The book website has the complete Table of Contents and a sample chapter available for download.
• Lamport. LaTeX: A document preparation system, 2nd edition User's guide and reference manual. ISBN. sample pages out of the book
• Kopka, Helmut and Daly, Patrick W.. Guide to LaTeX. ISBN 0-321-17385-6. sample pages out of the book
• D. F. Griffiths. Learning LaTeX. searchable version with sample pages

Platform-specific topics

• LaTeX, Emacs etc. for your PC (HTML) A useful and step-by-step guide to getting Miktex and Emacs working together on a Windows PC.
• TeX on Mac OS X Guide to using TeX and LaTeX on a Mac.

Online reference materials

• The (La)TeX encyclopaedia (HTML)
• Help with LaTeX (HTML) A LaTeX concept reference.
• The UK TeX FAQ (HTML) Frequently Asked Questions from comp.text.tex.
• Help:Formula Listing of math LaTeX tags on MetaWiki. Discussion of mathmatical formulas, including LaTeX markup.
• TeX Directory Structure, used by many (La)TeX distributions
• Obsolete packages and commands

Community resources

• Official LaTeX project site website for open development of LaTeX (has links to LaTeX2e and a beta/prerelease snapshot of LaTeX3)
• The TeX Users Group
• comp.text.tex. A Usenet newsgroup for (La)TeX related questions, comp.text.tex is an invaluable resource for (La)TeX. Search the archives with Google Groups before posting.
• #latex IRC chat room on Freenode
• The Comprehensive TeX Archive Network Latest (La)TeX-related packages and software

Usenet (USEr NETwork) is a global, distributed bulletin board system (BBS). ... IRC redirects here. ... The title of this article should be freenode. ...

Periodicals

• The PracTeX Journal. Online journal of the TeX Users Group.
• TUGboat. Print journal of the TeX Users Group.