Introduction to LaTeX:
typeset your own
science/engineering papers.

About

About this course

LaTeX is the standard mark-up language for professional typesetting of scientific and engineering documents (from papers to books). This will be a hands on seminar. It will cover from installation of LaTeX and of a text editor to producing a document with tables, figures and equations. Students are encouraged to bring their own laptop computer.

Practical Information

Where & When

Until Jan 12, Remote instruction: from home
From Jan 19: MHA 4623

Wednesdays, 2:00 pm - 2:50 pm.

Office Hours

Zoom or in person meetings, by request:
(send email to bgrinstein (AT) ucsd.edu). Will also hang out for a bit after class.

Prerequisites and Requirements

No previous coding knowledge required. Good disposition.

Access to a laptop computer is required, with:

  • A couple of GB of space on your hard drive (for LaTeX installation)
  • An internet connection
  • Administrator credentials on your laptop to install software

Teaching Evaluations

If the Dept. of Physics produces its own evaluations of instruction you will be asked to click HERE (Open Wed XXXX, 2021 2:00pm- 2:50pm).

Grading

Grading is exclusively by work done in (remote) class/attendance.

You will upload your work:

  • Within the last 5 min of lecture save your *.tex and produce a *.pdf output of your work
  • Upload your files (click here!) . Drag your pdf and tex files to the "pCloud" screen and fill in "Your name" field with LastName, FirstName.
  • Your grade is derived from counting these: for a "P" grade you must submit at least 80%.
  • If you must miss a class please let the instructor know (by email), and have a reasonable explanation.

Notes

Course Notes

These are intended as partly notes, partly listing of what is covered. Full(er) explanations will be given in the course, as we type away! Course slides are available here.

Fast Forward

The Not So Short Introduction to LaTeX2e is also availabe in many languages.

LaTeX Wikibook (PDF)

Instead of downloading this pdf you can, of course, just consult the wikibook online.

Exercises

Some of the challenges presented in class, directly form the class-slides. Will add to this as the course progresses. For the last exercise, you need the UCSD Tritons image gl-5-triton.png.

Team

Benjamin Grinstein

Professor of Physics

Prof. Grinstein's research interests are in Particle Physics and Quantum Field Theory. He uses TeX and LaTeX routinely to prepare his manuscripts and notes. He learned TeX as a grad student a million years ago.

Contact

Address

Office: Mayer Hall 5230

Email

bgrinstein@ucsd.edu

Phone
+1 858 534 5229

Prof. Grinstein is available for office hours on request. Best to send him an email or call him to arrange for a meeting. You are welcome to show up at his office unannounced, but you may find yourself waiting in line or just not finding him.