LaTeX

Latex is a program for typesetting papers. It is very good at typesetting math, so it is commonly used in fields that require equations to be displayed in papers.

Installation

To start writing Latex documents, you two things. A Latex ``compiler (this is a set of programs and files that allow you to generate pdfs from a Latex file), and a Latex editor (you can use a plain text editor, but an editor designed for Latex will have many more handy features). There are a few different Latex compilers and editors. The instructions below are to install the texlive compiler and texmaker editor.

Windows

1. download and run the install-tl.zip file from here http://www.tug.org/texlive/acquire-netinstall.html
2. install texmaker, which is cross platform, from here http://www.xm1math.net/texmaker/
3. configure texmaker: go to toolbar, choose options/quick build/User, add the following text

latex -interaction=nonstopmode %.tex|bibtex %.aux|latex -interaction=nonstopmode %.tex|latex -interaction=nonstopmode %.tex|dvips -t letter %.dvi -o %.ps|ps2pdf -dPDFSETTINGS=/prepress %.ps

Mac

1. Follow the instructions here http://www.tug.org/mactex/2011/
2. install texmaker, which is cross platform, from here http://www.xm1math.net/texmaker/

Ubuntu Linux

use synaptic to install the texmaker which will automatically install texlive as well

> sudo apt-get install texmaker

You may also want to to install the REVTeX package (https://authors.aps.org/revtex4/). Many APS journals use a style included in this package. However, it is not necessary to do this before starting to use Latex. For more information on installing custom document and bibliography styles, see http://www.math.uiuc.edu/~hildebr/tex/tips-customstyles.html

Here is a template that can be used for Advanced Lab: File:Advanced lab.tar (Use 7-Zip, http://www.7-zip.org/, on Windows to extract this .tar file.)

Using LaTeX

External References

There are many, many different websites full of tutorials and references for Latex. Here are a couple of good ones.

LaTeX Wikibook: http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/LaTeX

LaTeX Cookbook: http://www.personal.ceu.hu/tex/cookbook.html