{"id":106,"date":"2020-11-11T03:18:55","date_gmt":"2020-11-11T03:18:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nitens.org\/w\/?page_id=106"},"modified":"2021-04-03T22:48:20","modified_gmt":"2021-04-03T22:48:20","slug":"latex","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/nitens.org\/w\/latex\/","title":{"rendered":"The Beauty of\u00a0LaTeX"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Beauty of LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span><\/h2>\n
\n
Latest update<\/h5>\n

February 2015:<\/span> Featured in Hacker Monthly<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

There are several reasons why one should prefer LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> to a WYSIWYG<\/acronym> word processor like Microsoft Word: portability, lightness, security<\/em> are just a few of them (not to mention that LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> is free<\/em>). There is still a further reason that definitely convinced me to abandon MS Word<\/a> when I wrote my dissertation: you will never be able to produce professionally typeset<\/em> and well-structured<\/em> documents using most WYSIWYG<\/acronym> word processors. LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> is a free typesetting system that allows you to focus on content<\/em> without bothering about the layout: the software takes care of the actual typesetting, structuring and page formatting, producing documents of astonishing elegance. The software<\/a> I use to write in LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> on a Mac compiles documents in PDF format (but exporting to other formats such as RTF or HTML is also possible). It supports unicode<\/a> and all the advanced typographic features<\/a> of OpenType<\/a> and AAT<\/a> fonts, like Adobe Garamond Pro<\/em> and Hoefler Text<\/em>. It allows fine-tuned control on a number of typesetting options, although just using the default configuration results in documents with high typographic quality. In what follows I review some examples, comparing how fonts are rendered in MS Word and in LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span>.<\/p>\n

\n
See also<\/h5>\n<\/div>\n
\n

\"[latex]\"<\/a>Typesetting an academic CV in LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span><\/a>
\nTemplates to compile an academic curriculum vitae or resume using X\u018e<\/sub>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> and expert fonts.<\/p>\n

\"[latex]\"<\/a>Accessing OpenType font features in LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span><\/a>
\nHow to access advanced OpenType font features in X\u018e<\/sub>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> via the fontspec<\/tt> package.<\/p>\n

\"[latex<\/a>LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X <\/span>on Mac OS<\/a>
\nA review of open source software, tools and fonts to use LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> and X\u018e<\/sub>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> on Mac OS.<\/p>\n

\"[latex<\/a>Pure CSS TE<\/sub>X <\/span>logos<\/a>
\nA simple hack to generate TE<\/sub>X<\/span>, LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> and X\u018e<\/sub>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> logos in plain C<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Contents<\/h5>\n
    \n
  1. Kerning<\/a><\/li>\n
  2. Real Small Caps & Titling Caps<\/a><\/li>\n
  3. Common ligatures<\/a><\/li>\n
  4. Rare and ancient ligatures<\/a><\/li>\n
  5. Glyph variants<\/a><\/li>\n
  6. Transparency<\/a><\/li>\n
  7. Line breaks, justification and hyphenation<\/a><\/li>\n
  8. Getting expert fonts<\/a><\/li>\n
  9. Links<\/a><\/li>\n
  10. Acknowledgments<\/a><\/li>\n
  11. Technical notes<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    1. Kerning<\/h4>\n

    Kerning is the process of selectively adjusting the spacing between letters pairs to improve the overall appearance of text. Examples of letter pairs that need kerning treatment are AV, AY, PA, and AT. These letter pairs often look awkward together, and need to either be moved closer together, or further apart manually. Professional typesetting systems and fonts allow fine-grained adjustments for such letter pairs. Popular word processors either lack support for kerning tables or disable<\/em> kerning by default (this is the case with both Microsoft Word for Mac OS v.X and 2008) [Thanks to Mark Dancer and Nicholas Shera for pointing this out]<\/span>.<\/p>\n

    MS Word (wrong default kerning for the “Ta” letter pair):<\/h5>\n

    \"[example
    \n[Adobe Garamond Pro, 48pt]<\/span>     pdf<\/a><\/kbd> doc<\/a><\/kbd><\/p>\n

    LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> (correct kerning for the “Ta” letter pair):<\/h5>\n

    \"[example
    \n[Adobe Garamond Pro, 48pt]<\/span>     pdf<\/a><\/kbd> tex<\/a><\/kbd><\/p>\n

    \n

    <\/a><\/p>\n

    2. Real small caps and titling caps<\/h4>\n

    Most word processors create fake<\/em> small capitals by adjusting the size of capitals. Professional fonts contain different sets of glyphs for small capitals and full-size capitals that any serious typesetting system should be able to use in the appropriate context. In particular, real small capitals<\/em> are more than resized versions of uppercase capitals: they have a relatively heavier stroke and are designed to be visually compatible with lowercase characters of the same typeface. Some OpenType fonts have special \u201ctitling\u201d alternates that are designed for all-uppercase type set at large sizes and have a lighter stroke.<\/p>\n

    MS Word (fake small caps):<\/h5>\n

    \"[example
    \n[Adobe Garamond Pro, 48pt]<\/span>     pdf<\/a><\/kbd> doc<\/a><\/kbd><\/p>\n

    LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> (real small caps):<\/h5>\n

    \"[example
    \n[Adobe Garamond Pro, 48pt]<\/span>     pdf<\/a><\/kbd> tex<\/a><\/kbd><\/p>\n

    LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> (regular vs titling caps):<\/h5>\n

    \"[example
    \n[Adobe Garamond Pro, 120pt]<\/span>     pdf<\/a><\/kbd> tex<\/a><\/kbd><\/p>\n

    \n

    <\/a><\/p>\n

    3. Common ligatures<\/h4>\n

    A good typesetting programme should always use contextual intelligence and substitution tables to determine whether ligatures<\/a> are needed. Common ligatures are essential to professionally typeset text.<\/p>\n

    MS Word (common ligature errors):<\/h5>\n

    \"[example<\/p>\n

    [Hoefler Text, 48pt]<\/span> pdf<\/a><\/kbd> doc<\/a><\/kbd><\/div>\n
    LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> (correct use of ligatures):<\/h5>\n

    \"[example<\/p>\n

    [Hoefler Text, 48pt]<\/span> pdf<\/a><\/kbd> tex<\/a><\/kbd><\/div>\n
    \n

    <\/a><\/p>\n

    4. Rare and ancient ligatures<\/h4>\n

    X\u018e<\/sub>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> in conjunction with professional fonts gives the possibility to exploit the whole set of rare ligatures and decorations, that are automatically added to the text.<\/p>\n

    MS Word (text with no ligature):<\/h5>\n

    \"[text<\/p>\n

    [Adobe Minion Pro, 24pt]<\/span> pdf<\/a><\/kbd> doc<\/a><\/kbd><\/div>\n
    LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> (text with rare and old-style ligatures):<\/h5>\n

    \"[example<\/p>\n

    [Adobe Minion Pro, 24pt]<\/span> pdf<\/a><\/kbd> tex<\/a><\/kbd><\/div>\n

    \"[example<\/p>\n

    [Hoefler Text, 24pt]<\/span> pdf<\/a><\/kbd> tex<\/a><\/kbd><\/div>\n

    \"[example<\/p>\n

    [Skia, 24pt]<\/span> pdf<\/a><\/kbd> tex<\/a><\/kbd><\/div>\n
    \n

    <\/a><\/p>\n

    5. Glyph variants<\/h4>\n

    Expert fonts often include variants or alternate shapes for alphabetic characters and numbers. X\u018e<\/sub>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> with the fontspec package<\/a> offers the possibility to access and select variants on single characters or for a whole text block.<\/p>\n

    LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> (example of font variants):<\/h5>\n

    \"[example<\/p>\n

    [Zapfino, 25pt]<\/span> pdf<\/a><\/kbd> tex<\/a><\/kbd><\/div>\n
    \n

    <\/a><\/p>\n

    6. Transparency<\/h4>\n

    The fonstpec package<\/a> allows you to set font transparency in your X\u018e<\/sub>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> source.<\/p>\n

    LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> (alpha transparency)<\/h5>\n

    \"[example<\/p>\n

    [Hoefler Text Italic, 48+pt]<\/span> pdf<\/a><\/kbd> tex<\/a><\/kbd><\/div>\n
    \n

    <\/a><\/p>\n

    7. Line breaks, justification and hyphenation<\/h4>\n

    Readability results not only from a good selection of typefaces, but also from a correct distribution of characters and whitespace per line. To attain this goal, most WYSIWYG<\/acronym> word processors use relatively dumb justification\/hyphenation procedures (i.e. algorithms that establish the position for line breaks by processing text line by line<\/em>). LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> uses an advanced algorithm, based on seminal work<\/a> by Donald Knuth and Michael F. Plass and enhanced by Frank Liang in 1983 for his PhD dissertation, which considers paragraphs as `wholes\u00b4 in order to decide where to add line breaks. The algorithm uses language-specific patterns in order to decide the preferred position for hyphenation. The engine then selects line breaks so as to make paragraphs look as good as possible<\/em>. Information that is taken into account for calculating optimal line breaks includes the number of consecutive lines ending with hyphens, word tightness on each line, the change of tightness between consecutive lines. Further development has enabled the LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span> engine to allow certain characters to stick into the margin, thus generating an optically<\/em> straight margin – i.e., a margin that looks<\/em> straight without being geometrically so. LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span>‘s hyphenation settings can be fine-tuned by expert users.<\/p>\n

    Advanced hyphenation\/justification in LA<\/sup>TE<\/sub>X<\/span>:<\/h5>\n

    \"[example<\/p>\n

    [Hoefler Text, 10pt]<\/span> pdf<\/a><\/kbd> tex<\/a><\/kbd><\/div>\n