A Beginner's Introduction to Typesetting With LaTeX

Peter Kitson

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Sample Chapter From A Beginner's Introduction to Typesetting With LaTeX
     Copyright © Peter Flynn



Introduction


This book originally accompanied a 2-day course on using the LATEX typesetting system. It has been extensively revised and updated and can now be used for self-study or in the classroom. It is aimed at users of Linux, Macintosh, or Microsoft Windows but it can be used with LATEX systems on any platform, including other Unix workstations, mainframes, and even your Personal Digital Assistant (PDA).

Skills needed

LATEX is a very easy system to learn, and requires no specialist knowledge, although literacy and some familiarity with the publishing process is useful. It is, however, assumed that you are completely  fluent and familiar with using your computer before you start. Specifically, effective use of this document requires that you already know and understand the following very thoroughly:

  • How to use a good plain-text editor (not a wordprocessor like OpenOffice,WordPerfect, or MicrosoftWord, and not a toy like Microsoft Notepad);
  • Where to find all 95 of the printable ASCII characters on your keyboard and what they mean, and how to type accents and symbols, if you use them;
  • How to create, open, save, close, rename, move, and delete files and folders (directories);
  • How to use a Web browser and/or File Transfer Protocol (FTP) program to download and save files from the Internet;
  • How to uncompress and unwrap (unzip or detar) downloaded files.

If you don\'t know how to do these things yet, it\'s important to go and learn them first. Trying to become familiar with the fundamentals of using a computer at the same time as learning LATEX is not likely to be as effective as doing them in order.

These are not specialist skills - they are all included in the European Computer Driving Licence (ECDL) and the relevant sections of the ECDL syllabus are noted in the margin above, so they are well within the capability of anyone who uses a computer.