Pointers to Frequently Asked and Answered Questions
comp.text.tex
TeX is a typesetting program designed for high-quality composition of material that contains a lot of mathematical and technical expressions. It has been adopted by many authors and publishers who generate technical books and papers. It was created by Professor Donald Knuth of Stanford University, originally for preparation of his book series "The Art of Computer Programming". TeX has been made freely available by Knuth in a generic form. For more information about Donald Knuth, see
http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/index.html
TeX produces a "DeVice Independent" (DVI) file as output. This file contains only positioning information and pointers to fonts, text characters and rules, and must be translated to a device-specific form for printing or display.
TeX implementations are governed by the principle that the same input should produce the same output, modulo font availability and output device resolution. All implementations wishing to call themselves "TeX" must pass a "trip test" that assures adherence to these guidelines.
TeX has been tailored for and installed on almost every platform (computer + operating system) that one can imagine, and is available as freeware, shareware and commercial implementations. The TeX program is usually accompanied by other software to form a complete and usable system. This software is not listed in this FAQ; see below for references to where more information can be found.
A list of freeware and shareware implementations can be found on the
web at
http://www.tug.org/interest.html#free
A list of commercial vendors can be found at
http://www.tug.org/interest.html#vendors
Additional information can be found in the on-line FAQ compiled and maintained by volunteers from the UK TeX Users Group (see below).
The TeX program itself is a macro compiler. This engine is always required when processing any of the macro systems described below.
TeX input consists of a stream of mixed commands and text. Commands can be defined for many purposes, not the least important of which is to permit input to be structured in a logical manner, allowing an author to concentrate on content rather than on typographic appearance.
The most popular such macro set is LaTeX. This tool provides several predefined documentclasses (book, journal, report) with extensive sectioning and cross-referencing capabilities, and auxiliary tools for such processes as bibliography and index creation. Originally created by Leslie Lamport, LaTeX is now maintained by a small group of volunteers headed by Frank Mittelbach and Chris Rowley. The current version identifies itself when it starts up as LaTeX 2e; older versions may still exist, but are not recommended for creating new documents. The current LaTeX distribution is always available from CTAN (see below).
AMS-TeX and AMS-LaTeX are macro collections developed at the American Mathematical Society for preparing publications containing extensive mathematical content. AMS-TeX works directly with TeX, and AMS-LaTeX works on top of LaTeX. More information on these collections can be found at the AMS web site, http://www.ams.org/tex/; they are also mirrored at CTAN.
Texinfo is the documentation format created by the GNU project. This macro set is designed to generate both print and on-line output (an "Info file", HTML, plain text, ...) from a single source file. Texinfo is integrated with GNU emacs, and that editor can be used (but is not required) both to read Info files and create Texinfo source. For more information, see http://www.gnu.org
See the section "Where can I find a real FAQ?" for pointers to more information.
CTAN is the Comprehensive TeX Archive Network.
CTAN consists of several primary hosts and many more mirror sites. The backbone sites coordinate their holdings with the intention that the material at one site is never more than 24 hours out of phase with the primary host of record. All primary hosts and mirror sites are connected to the Internet and are accessible by anonymous FTP; most sites are also accessible via the World Wide Web.
At present, these are the primary CTAN hosts:
ftp host CTAN root Sponsor/location
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ftp.dante.de /tex-archive DANTE, e.V. (Heidelberg, Germany)
ftp.tex.ac.uk /tex-archive Cambridge University (U.K.)
ctan.tug.org /tex-archive TeX Users Group (Boston, U.S.A.)
A current list of all CTAN sites can be found in the file CTAN.sites located in the CTAN root area on all of these hosts. Or you can finger ctan@ctan.org to get the mirror list.
Also in the root area of a CTAN site are several files giving the complete directory of the site's holdings:
FILES.bydate arranged in date order, most recent first
FILES.byname arranged in order of the directory tree
FILES.bysize arranged in order by size, largest first
In addition, the file FILES.last07days highlights the recent additions and changes to the archive. These FILES.* files are refreshed nightly. Please note that references in these files, and in general all CTAN references, are specified relative to the CTAN root. Thus at the primary hosts, a file listed as info/latex.hlp would be found in /tex-archive/info/latex.hlp on the core sites; the root isn't necessarily in the same place at mirror sites.
A web interface to CTAN can be found at
http://ctan.org/
This page will help to identify a CTAN site close to your location.
The oldest such organization, the TeX Users Group (TUG), currently has its office in Portland, Oregon, USA. TUG publishes a quarterly journal, TUGboat, holds an annual meeting, and sponsors other activities from time to time. Check the web page
http://www.tug.org/
There are many "local" TeX user groups. The oldest and largest of these are in western Europe, and most have their own web sites:
DANTE (Germany): http://www.dante.de/
GUTenberg (France): http://www.ens.fr/gut/
NTG (Netherlands): http://www.ntg.nl/
UK TeX User's Group (UK): http://www.tex.ac.uk/UKTUG/
More groups are being formed all the time. A comprehensive list is given in
http://www.tug.org/lugs.html
As may be fairly obvious by now, the present collection of information is not going to answer any serious questions about using TeX or finding particular TeX tools. There are several resources much better equipped and maintained for that purpose.
There are three serious FAQ collections available in as many languages and various formats. Anyone with a specific question about TeX and friends is directed to one of those sources.
In English, the FAQ of record has been compiled and is maintained by volunteers from the UK TeX Users Group. A searchable on-line version can be found at
http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html
A printable version is available from CTAN, in
usergrps/uktug/faq/newfaq.ps (for A4 paper)
usergrps/uktug/faq/newfaq.pdf (likewise)
usergrps/uktug/faq/letterfaq.ps (for U.S. letter-size paper)
usergrps/uktug/faq/letterfaq.pdf (likewise)
A French LaTeX FAQ can be found in fr.comp.tex.tex, fr.usenet.reponses and news.answers. It was last updated in February 1998; the maintainer was unable to continue after that, and a new maintainer is sought.
The French group, GUTenberg (Groupe des Utilisateurs francophones de TeX) has a web site called the (La)TeX navigator, "Une encyclopedie (La)TeX" at
http://www.loria.fr/services/tex/index.html
A German "DE-TeX-/DANTE-FAQ" is posted monthly to the newsgroup de.comp.text.tex and is available at the usual FAQ archives as well as in de.answers and news.answers. A copy can also be found at
http://www.dante.de/faq/de-tex-faq/
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This file will be posted monthly to
comp.text.tex, and archived in the usual newsgroup archives. It will be updated as necessary, but not extended; maintenance of a comprehensive FAQ for all phases of TeX is beyond the capability of a single person. The pointers given above should be more than adequate to help one find answers to most frequently asked questions; other questions can be directed to the newsgroup.Compiled by Barbara Beeton (bnb@ams.org)
This document was generated on 30 November 1998 using the texi2html translator version 1.51a.