Introduction to TeX November 3, 2020 Sarah Renfro 

Topics About TeX ➔ What is it? ➔ Who uses it? ➔ Namesake ➔ Goals of Tex Features of TeX ➔ Mathematical Typesetting ➔ Math Mode ➔ Algorithmic Line Breaking ➔ Labels & Cross-Reference ➔ Generated Content ➔ Packages Motivation for TeX ➔ About the designer ➔ End of Monotype ➔ Rise of Digital Typesetters ➔ Commitment to Design Development of TeX ➔ Literate Programming ➔ Bug Handling Conclusion ➔ Summary ➔ Recommendations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 

Topics About TeX ➔ What is it? ➔ Who uses it? ➔ Namesake ➔ Goals of Tex Features of TeX ➔ Mathematical Typesetting ➔ Math Mode ➔ Algorithmic Line Breaking ➔ Labels & Cross-Reference ➔ Generated Content ➔ Packages Motivation for TeX ➔ About the designer ➔ End of Monotype ➔ Rise of Digital Typesetters ➔ Commitment to Design Development of TeX ➔ Literate Programming ➔ Bug Handling Conclusion ➔ Summary ➔ Recommendations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 

What is TeX? ● An open source typesetting system ● Designed and mostly written by Donald Knuth (Ka-NOOTH) ● Released in 1978 About TeX It has been noted as one of the most sophisticated digital typographical systems. 

Who uses TeX and Why? In several technical fields such as computer science, mathematics, engineering and physics, TeX has become a de facto standard for creating typed material. It has not been as successful in other fields as in the more technical fields, as TeX was primarily designed to typeset mathematics. Donald Knuth designed many hooks inside the program so that it would be possible for publishers to design extensions tailoring it to their own needs. About TeX 

Namesake The letters of the name are meant to represent the capital Greek letters tau, epsilon, and chi, as TeX is an abbreviation of τέχνη (ΤΕΧΝΗ – technē), Greek for both "art" and "craft", which is also the root word of technical. tau epsilon chi About TeX 

Goals of TeX Allow anybody to produce high-quality books with minimal effort Provide a system that would give exactly the same results on all computers, at any point in time About TeX 1. 2. 

Topics About TeX ➔ What is it? ➔ Who uses it? ➔ Namesake ➔ Goals of Tex Features of TeX ➔ Mathematical Typesetting ➔ Math Mode ➔ Algorithmic Line Breaking ➔ Labels & Cross-Reference ➔ Generated Content ➔ Packages Motivation for TeX ➔ About the designer ➔ End of Monotype ➔ Rise of Digital Typesetters ➔ Commitment to Design Development of TeX ➔ Literate Programming ➔ Bug Handling Conclusion ➔ Summary ➔ Recommendations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 

Mathematical Typesetting Features of TeX 

Math Mode Features of TeX The quadratic formula is $-b \pm \sqrt{b^2 - 4ac} \over 2a$ The quadratic formula is $$-b \pm \sqrt{b^2 - 4ac} \over 2a$$ 

Math Mode Features of TeX 

Algorithmic Line Breaking Features of TeX Tex uses a total-fit line breaking algorithm developed by Donald Knuth and Michael Plass that considers all the possible breakpoints in a paragraph, and finds the combination of line breaks that will produce the most globally pleasing arrangement. 

Labels & Cross-Reference Features of TeX \begin{figure} \centering \includegraphics[width=0.5\textwidth]{gull} \caption{Close-up of a gull} \label{fig:gull} \end{figure} Figure \ref{fig:gull} shows a photograph of a gull. Control over large documents containing sectioning, cross-references, tables and figures. 

Generated Content Features of TeX Automatic generation of List of Figures, Table of Contents, Bibliographies, and more \tableofcontents 

Packages Features of TeX AMS Package \begin{theorem}[Theorem Name Here] Theorem Statement Here \end{theorem} \begin{proof} \begin{align} y &= (x+1)^2 \\ &= x^2+2x+1 \end{align} \end{proof} 

Topics About TeX ➔ What is it? ➔ Who uses it? ➔ Namesake ➔ Goals of Tex Features of TeX ➔ Mathematical Typesetting ➔ Math Mode ➔ Algorithmic Line Breaking ➔ Labels & Cross-Reference ➔ Generated Content ➔ Packages Motivation for TeX ➔ About the designer ➔ End of Monotype ➔ Rise of Digital Typesetters ➔ Commitment to Design Development of TeX ➔ Literate Programming ➔ Bug Handling Conclusion ➔ Summary ➔ Recommendations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 

Young Donald Knuth Motivation for TeX Young Knuth was fascinated with books and even notably “the individual letters in books.” https://web.archive.org/web/20180127194502/http://www.kyotoprize.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/12kA_lct_EN.pdf 

Career Donald Knuth Motivation for TeX Knuth becomes a professor at Stanford and publishes his first books, Volume 1 and 2 of The Art of Computer Programming. They were produced with a 19th-century technology called Monotype, that Knuth admires for it’s “classic style.” https://web.archive.org/web/20180127194502/http://www.kyotoprize.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/12kA_lct_EN.pdf 

Monotype Motivation for TeX A complex pneumatic keyboard with 284 keys that produced a punched paper tape something like a player-piano roll. The special casting machine that produced individual pieces of type from hot molten lead from the paper tape. https://web.archive.org/web/20190819211815/http://www.literateprogramming.com/knuthweb.pdf 

Motivation for TeX “I didn’t know what to do. I had spent 15 years writing those books, but if they were going to look awful I didn’t want to write any more. How could I be proud of such a product?” - Donald Knuth https://web.archive.org/web/20180127194502/http://www.kyotoprize.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/12kA_lct_EN.pdf End of Monotype 

Motivation for TeX https://web.archive.org/web/20180127194502/http://www.kyotoprize.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/12kA_lct_EN.pdf Rise of Digital Typesetters The shapes of letters were now made from tiny little dots, based on electronic pulses that were either ON or OFF. “But letters made of little dots—that’s computer science! That’s just bits, binary digits, 0s and 1s! Put a 1 where you want ink, put a 0 where you don’t want ink, and you can print a page of a book!” - Donald Knuth 

Motivation for TeX https://web.archive.org/web/20180127194502/http://www.kyotoprize.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/12kA_lct_EN.pdf Commitment to Design Knuth could not resist solving this typography problem and felt compelled to write computer programs that would generate the patterns of 0s and 1s for his publications. 

Topics About TeX ➔ What is it? ➔ Who uses it? ➔ Namesake ➔ Goals of Tex Features of TeX ➔ Mathematical Typesetting ➔ Math Mode ➔ Algorithmic Line Breaking ➔ Labels & Cross-Reference ➔ Generated Content ➔ Packages Motivation for TeX ➔ About the designer ➔ End of Monotype ➔ Rise of Digital Typesetters ➔ Commitment to Design Development of TeX ➔ Literate Programming ➔ Bug Handling Conclusion ➔ Summary ➔ Recommendations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 

Literate Programming The original source code for the current TeX software is written in WEB, a computer programming system created by Donald Knuth himself. WEB is the first implementation of what he called "literate programming." The idea that one could create software as works of literature, by embedding source code inside descriptive text, rather than the reverse , in an order that is convenient for exposition to human readers, rather than in the order demanded by the compiler. Development 

"Instead of imagining that our main task is to instruct a computer what to do, let us concentrate rather on explaining to human beings what we want a computer to do." - Donald Knuth https://web.archive.org/web/20190819211815/http://www.literateprogramming.com/knuthweb.pdf Development 

Bug Solving Reward Knuth offers monetary awards to people who find and report a bug in TeX. The award per bug starts at $2.56 (one "hexadecimal dollar") and doubles every year until it is frozen at $327.68 Knuth has lost relatively little money as there have been very few bugs claimed. In addition, recipients have been known to frame their check as proof that they found a bug in TeX rather than cashing it. Development 

Topics About TeX ➔ What is it? ➔ Who uses it? ➔ Namesake ➔ Goals of Tex Features of TeX ➔ Mathematical Typesetting ➔ Math Mode ➔ Algorithmic Line Breaking ➔ Labels & Cross-Reference ➔ Generated Content ➔ Packages Motivation for TeX ➔ About the designer ➔ End of Monotype ➔ Rise of Digital Typesetters ➔ Commitment to Design Development of TeX ➔ Literate Programming ➔ Bug Handling Conclusion ➔ Summary ➔ Recommendations 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 

TeX is... Conclusion A powerful, open source typesetting system, designed by a passionate computer scientist who envisioned that anybody could produce high-quality published works with minimal effort. 

Recommended Resource Conclusion https://www.overleaf.com/ ● Cloud-Based ● Real Time Collaboration ● Document History ● No installations ● Templates https://www.overleaf.com/learn/latex/Learn_LaTeX_in_30_minutes 

Recommended Reading Love at First Byte - Short article on Donald Knuth’s life https://web.archive.org/web/20060604115901/http://www.stanfordalumni. org/news/magazine/2006/mayjun/features/knuth.html Commemorative lecture of the Kyoto Prize, 1996 - Transcript https://web.archive.org/web/20180127194502/http://www.kyotoprize.org/ wp/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/12kA_lct_EN.pdf Conclusion