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<html>
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<title>Front and Back: Kile and LaTeX LG #106</title>
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<h1>Front and Back: Kile and LaTeX</h1>
<p id="by"><b>By <A HREF="../authors/oregan.html">Jimmy O'Regan</A></b></p>
<p>
<h3>Introduction</h3>
<p><a href="http://www.latex-project.org/">LaTeX</a> is a document
preparation system based on Donald Knuth's TeX. LaTeX provides the
facilities needed to typeset articles, books, and other documents.
<a href="http://kile.sourceforge.net/">Kile</a> is a KDE-based
environment for editing LaTeX documents, which simplifies the
process and provides easy access to commonly used commands and
tags.</p>
<p>As well as offering short cuts to the various commands used to
convert LaTeX documents, and to launch the viewers for these
formats, Kile provides an output window, so you can view an errors
which may have been present in your document, and an embedded
Konsole window, so you can easily launch any other commands you
wish without switching windows.</p>
<p>TeX is used by so many of the various documentation tools
available for Linux that LaTeX is worth learning, if for no other
reason than it's available almost everywhere. TeX (and, by
extension, LaTeX) still has the best rendering available for
mathematics, so if you ever plan to typeset a complicated formula,
you would do well to learn it. LaTeX is being used by Project
Gutenberg for mathematical books, and a subset of TeX's math syntax
is used by Wikipedia.</p>
<p>If you've written HTML before, basic LaTeX shouldn't be too hard
to grasp. For example, <i>text in italics</i> is written like this
in HTML: <code><i>text in italics</i></code>; and like
this in LaTeX: <code>\textit{text in italics}</code>.</p>
<h3>Coming Clean</h3>
<p>Now, there isn't much to be said about using Kile. Kile
<em>is</em> useful - it certainly saves a lot of time to be able to
select the tags you want from a menu. It also saves time to use the
document creation toolbar - the commands these tools invoke can be
summarized, left to right (see below), as follows:
<br>
<img src="misc/oregan/kile-doctools.png" alt="Tool icons"></p>
<ol>
<li><tt>latex <i>filename</i>.tex</tt></li>
<li><tt>kdvi <i>filename</i>.dvi</tt></li>
<li><tt>dvips <i>filename</i>.dvi -o <i>filename</i>.ps</tt></li>
<li><tt>kghostview <i>filename</i>.ps</tt></li>
<li><tt>pdflatex <i>filename</i>.tex</tt></li>
<li><tt>kpdf <i>filename</i>.pdf</tt></li>
</ol>
<p>Note that Kile uses <tt>pdflatex</tt>. This, in my opinion, is
not the best way to generate a PDF file from LaTeX. In my
experience, <tt>pdflatex</tt> has failed to include images. My
preferred way to generate PDF files (using an <a href=
"misc/oregan/sk.tex.txt">article about SuperKaramba</a> that I
never got around to finishing as an example) is:</p>
<pre class="code">
latex sk.tex
dvips sk.dvi -o sk.ps
ps2pdf sk.ps sk.pdf
</pre>
<h3>Starting a New Document</h3>
<p>Kile is a KDE application, so starting a new document is done
the same way as with any other KDE application:
<code>File->New</code>, or <code>Ctrl-N</code>. Kile offers a
choice of "Empty Document", "Article", "Book", "Letter", or
"Report". I'll presume you want to use "Article" - I'll be using
(parts of) this article as an example - but it shouldn't be too
difficult to use the other templates.</p>
<pre class="code">
\documentclass[a4paper,10pt]{article}
%opening
\title{}
\author{}
\begin{document}
\maketitle
\begin{abstract}
\end{abstract}
\section{}
\end{document}
</pre>
<p>Not too scary, I'm sure you'll agree! Most basic commands have
the same formula: <code>\command{parameter}</code>. There are some
differences, like <code>\maketitle</code>, but it's true for most
of the common commands. Filling this out looks like this:</p>
<pre class="code">
\documentclass[a4paper,10pt]{article}
\usepackage{hyperref}
%opening
\title{Front and Back: Kile and LaTeX}
\author{Jimmy O'Regan}
\begin{document}
\maketitle
\begin{abstract}
Kile is a user-friendly frontend to \LaTeX{}. This article discusses using
Kile, and using \LaTeX{} without it.
\end{abstract}
\section{Introduction}
\href{http://www.latex-project.org/}{\LaTeX{}} is a document preparation
system based on Donald Knuth's \TeX{}. \LaTeX{} provides the facilities needed
to write articles, books, and other documents.
\href{http://kile.sourceforge.net}{Kile} is a KDE-based environment for editing
LaTeX documents, which simplifies the process and provides easy access to
commonly used commands and tags.
</pre>
<p>Note the <code>\usepackage{hyperref}</code> line: this tells
LaTeX to use the hyperref package, which adds some extra commands
for Web links (I use it for the <code>\href{}{}</code> command).
One difference between HTML and LaTeX is that LaTeX does not
require a command for a new paragraph; you simply leave a blank
line between paragraphs, and LaTeX figures it out. LaTeX has a
number of special characters which HTML doesn't: most of these can
be used by escaping them with a backslash ('\'), but the backslash
itself must be inserted as <code>$\backslash$</code>, because a
double backslash ('\\') is used to force a line break. Here is a
table of some common HTML tags and their LaTeX equivalents:</p>
<table>
<tr>
<th></th>
<th>HTML</th>
<th>LaTeX</th>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>Italics</th>
<td><i>Italics</i></td>
<td>\textit{Italics}</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>Bold</th>
<td><b>Bold</b></td>
<td>\textbf{Bold}</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>Typewriter</th>
<td><tt>Type</tt></td>
<td>\texttt{Type}</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>Hyperlink</th>
<td><a href="http://">text</a></td>
<td>\href{text}{http://}</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>Heading</th>
<td><h1>Heading</h1></td>
<td>\section{Heading}</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>Subheading</th>
<td><h2>Subheading</h2></td>
<td>\subsection{Subheading}</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th><</th>
<td>&lt;</td>
<td>$<$</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>></th>
<td>&gt;</td>
<td>$>$</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>&</th>
<td>&amp;</td>
<td>\&</td>
</tr>
</table>
<h3>Environments</h3>
<p>More complicated things in LaTeX are done in different
environments - these commands look like this:</p>
<pre>
\begin{environment}
...
\end{environment}
</pre>
<p>Kile helpfully fills in the <code>\end{}</code> part for you
automatically, after a blank line. It's a small time saver, but it
is useful.</p>
<p> Most of these environments can have a <code>\label{}</code>
tag attached, which allows you to set a description which "follows"
the environment. <a href="misc/oregan/feedreader.tex.txt">This
file</a> contains an example of the use of the label tag, attached
to a <tt>verbatim</tt> environment.</p>
<p>Different lists are available as environments, for example;
<code><ol></code> in HTML translates to
<code>\begin{enumerate}</code>, and <code><ul></code>
translates to <code>\begin{itemize}</code>. The <code>\item</code>
tag is used in place of <code><li></code>. This list:</p>
<ol>
<li>First</li>
<li>Second</li>
</ol>
<p>Looks like this:</p>
<pre class="code">
\begin{enumerate}
\item First
\item Second
\end{enumerate}
</pre>
<p>Another common HTML equivalent is the "verbatim" environment in
place of the <pre> tag. The "verbatim" environment is
different to HTML's "pre" tag though; HTML elements must be
escaped, whereas in the "verbatim" environment all processing stops
until the <code>\end{verbatim}</code> tag, so nothing need be
escaped.</p>
<h3>Things not available in HTML</h3>
<p>Because LaTeX is a document preparation system, it has quite a
few commands which have no equivalents in HTML, but which are
useful for creating documents such as books. Tags such as
<code>\chapter{}</code> are self explanatory; one thing which might
provide a little confusion is the use of footnotes.</p>
<p>While in the paragraph environment, a footnote can be inserted
by simply adding <code>\footnote{Text of footnote}</code>. In other
environments, however, you have to use the
<code>\footnotemark</code> tag while inside the environment,
followed by the <code>\footnotetext{Text of the footnote}</code>
when you're outside of that environment. So, if you wanted to add a
footnote inside a footnote (if you're a Terry Pratchett fan, you'll
understand!), it would look like this:</p>
<pre class="code">
Here you would have your text, as usual\footnote{Or as unusual\footnotemark}.
You can then continue your paragraph text.
\footnotetext{At least I hope you find footnotes within footnotes unusual}
</pre>
<p>(<a href="misc/oregan/rdf.tex.txt">This file</a>, a version
of my RDF article from last month, contains an example of the
use of a footnote).</p>
<h3>Non-English Symbols</h3>
<p>LaTeX supports most modern languages. The most commonly needed
symbols (in my part of the world, at least) are the letters of the
Greek alphabet, and the various symbols used in the Latin alphabet,
such as the umlaut or acute.</p>
<p>Kile helpfully provides a sidepane for Greek, and another with
many of the Latin symbols. Here's another table of some symbols,
with their <a href=
"http://www.htmlhelp.com/reference/html40/entities/">HTML</a> and
LaTeX equivalents:</p>
<table>
<tr>
<th></th>
<th>HTML</th>
<th>LaTeX</th>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>α</th>
<td>&alpha;</td>
<td>\alpha</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>ä</th>
<td>&auml;</td>
<td>\"a</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>é</th>
<td>&eacute;</td>
<td>\'e</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>Æ</th>
<td>&AElig;</td>
<td>\AE{}</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>Ç</th>
<td>&Ccedil;</td>
<td>\c{C}</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>ù</th>
<td>&ugrave;</td>
<td>\`u</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>ô</th>
<td>&ocirc;</td>
<td>\^o</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>ñ</th>
<td>&ntilde;</td>
<td>\~n</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>ß</th>
<td>&szlig;</td>
<td>\ss{}</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>œ</th>
<td>&oelig;</td>
<td>\oe{}</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>å</th>
<td>&ring;</td>
<td>\aa{}</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th>ø</th>
<td>&oslash;</td>
<td>\o{}</td>
</tr>
</table>
<p>I sometimes proofread for <a href="http://pgdp.net">Distributed
Proofreaders</a>, where from time to time there are books which use
odd things such as an AE ligature with an acute
(<code>\'\AE{}</code>). One book that was recently posted is <a
href=
"http://www.gutenberg.net/dirs/1/3/3/2/13320/13320-h/13320-h.htm">JUAN
MASILI Ó Ang pinuno n~g tulisán</a>, which is in old
Tagalog. Old Tagalog uses a g with a tilde. HTML doesn't support
this, but LaTeX does: <code>\~g</code>. There are many, many
strange characters available for use in LaTeX - so many, that I'm
not going to go looking for them all (well... that, and
laziness).</p>
<h3>Tables</h3>
<p>It's probably better to show an example of a table than to try
to talk about it too much:</p>
<pre class="code">
\begin{tabular}{rcl}
1 & 2 & 3 \\
4 & 5 & 6
\end{tabular}
</pre>
<p>The <code>{rcl}</code> means that there are three columns in
this table, the first is <b>r</b>ight aligned, second is
<b>c</b>entred, and the third is <b>l</b>eft aligned. Each column
is separated with an ampersand (<code>&</code>); each row is
separated with a newline (<code>\\</code>). The row and column
separation used in tables is also used in similar environments,
such as matrices and equations, so it's important to know how to
use tables if you want to typeset complicated equations in LaTeX.</p>
<p>Let's look at part of the first table, formatted for LaTeX:</p>
<pre class="code">
\begin{tabular}{cll}
& HTML & \LaTeX{} \\
Italics & $<$i$>$ & $\backslash$textit\{Italics\} \\
Bold & $<$b$>$Bold$<$/b$>$ & $\backslash$textbf\{Bold\} \\
Hyperlink & $<$a href="http://"$>$text$<$/a$>$ & $\backslash$href\{text\}\{http://\} \\
$<$ & \&lt; & \$$<$\$ \\
$>$ & \&gt; & \$$>$\$ \\
\& & \&amp; & $\backslash$\&
\end{tabular}
</pre>
<p>(And maybe now you see why I didn't redo this whole article as
an example, as I had originally intended!)</p>
<h3>Mathematics</h3>
<p>I mentioned that LaTeX is <i>the</i> typesetting system for
mathematics... I also don't want to get into it too deeply, as typesetting
mathematical equations in LaTeX is a topic worthy of a book, not an article.</p>
<p>In general, simple maths can be included by enclosing them within
dollar signs:</p>
<pre class="code">
$2 + 2 = 4$
</pre>
This might explain why certain things, such as the "less than"
(<) and "greater than" (>) symbols need to be surrounded by
dollar signs. LaTeX also allows you to use the "proper"
multiplication and division symbols:
<pre class="code">
$x = 2 \times 3 \div y$
</pre>
Lets look at an image and the LaTeX used to generate it:
<p><img src="misc/oregan/tmath1.png" alt="Formula"></p>
<pre class="code">
\left(\frac{a}{b}\right)^2 = \frac{a}{b} \times \frac{a}{b} = \frac{a^2}{b^2}
</pre>
<p>Here we have large parentheses (<code>\left(</code>,
<code>\right)</code>), fractions (<code>\frac{}{}</code>), and
simple superscripts (<code>a^2</code>). To use more than a single
character in a superscript or subscript (<code>_</code>), they are
enclosed with braces: <code>a^{13 + 2}_{4 - 6}</code>. (This
example is taken from <a href=
"http://www.gutenberg.net/1/3/3/0/13309/">A First Book in
Algebra</a>, which was recently posted to Project Gutenberg. If you
want to learn about typesetting mathematics with LaTeX, have a look at the
source of this book).</p>
<p>Let's look at a simple array. As I mentioned earlier, many of
the mathematical environments are special cases of tables:</p>
<pre class="code">
\begin{array}{cc}
3 & 4 \\
4 & 5
\end{array}
</pre>
<p>Another example is an equation array, which is used to align a
formula, normally to the 'equals' symbol (the convention is to
write this as <code>&=&</code>, to show the alignment more
clearly):</p>
<pre class="code">
\begin{eqnarray}
a &=& 5 + 6 \\
b + 6 - 3 &=& 2 - a
\end{eqnarray}
</pre>
<p>This is almost the same as this table, except the equation is
centred, and each line is numbered:</p>
<pre class="code">
\begin{tabular}{rcl}
a &=& 5 + 6 \\
b + 6 - 3 &=& 2 - a
\end{tabular}
</pre>
<h3>Conclusion</h3>
<p>LaTeX is a powerful text formatting language, and I've barely
covered the tip of the iceberg in this article. Kile is a great
tool to assist your use of LaTeX (though I've hardly covered it at
all) - it can really save you time remembering which environment
you need by offering them from a menu, and for those new to LaTeX,
it can be a godsend.</p>
<p>If you don't want to edit LaTeX by yourself, there are tools
available which will generate LaTeX from other formats.
<a href="http://html2latex.sourceforge.net/">html2latex</a>, for
example, converts HTML to LaTeX, and <a
href="http://wiki.auf-trag.de/">this site</a> converts Wikipedia
articles to LaTeX. (<a
href="misc/oregan/wikipedia.tex.txt">Example</a>).</p>
</p>
<!-- *** BEGIN author bio *** -->
<P>
<P>
<!-- *** BEGIN bio *** -->
<hr>
<P>
<img ALIGN="LEFT" ALT="[BIO]" SRC="../gx/authors/oregan.jpg" class="bio">
<em>
Jimmy has been using computers from the tender age of seven, when his father
inherited an Amstrad PCW8256. After a few brief flirtations with an Atari ST
and numerous versions of DOS and Windows, Jimmy was introduced to Linux in 1998
and hasn't looked back.
<P> Jimmy is a father of one, a techno-savvy seven year-old called Mark. In
the spare time he enjoys outside of his personal circle of Hell, working in a
factory, Jimmy likes to play guitar and edit Wikipedia.
</em>
<br CLEAR="all">
<!-- *** END bio *** -->
<!-- *** END author bio *** -->
<div id="articlefooter">
<p>
Copyright © 2004, Jimmy O'Regan. Released under the
<a href="http://linuxgazette.net/copying.html">Open Publication license</a>
</p>
<p>
Published in Issue 106 of Linux Gazette, September 2004
</p>
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