TeX, LaTeX and Friends

6:12 AM

@barbarabeeton have you suggested creating an article about the different types of zeros?... oh my! Where does that concern come from? Do you know how to use it in listings package in a easy way? Thank you!

Harald Hanche-Olsen

8:17 AM

@FaheemMitha You may or may not get some tips out of this answer.

David Carlisle

@manooooh that article is mostly about font design, so for listings you just pick a font that has the sort of 0 that you want

Paulo Cereda

Quack :)

Diaa

I found that the parent file has an arara command
pdflatex: { options: " -synctex=1 -shell-escape " }
which follows the deprecated arara structure.

However, I don't understand something; I tought that compiling the parent from the child will only parse the pdflatex options from the child file only not those found in the parent file.

For example, I wrote in the child
% arara: pdflatex: { interaction: nonstopmode, files: [..\parent.tex]}

and in the parent
% arara: pdflatex: { synctex: yes}

I found out in the log file that only the option synctex: yes is parsed without considering at all…

Paulo Cereda

@Diaa arara extracts directives from the file you are in, not the one you are specifying through files.

The reason is that we are processing directives at this moment, not later.

When you use files, you are providing a different file applied to the current directive/rule and associated parameters in analysis.

(do not know if I made clear, it's just 5:30 in the morning here, so I am a bit sleepy)

By the way, options should raise an error in arara 4.0, as it now expects a list. The new way of writing it should be done like this:

pdflatex: { options: [ '-synctex=1', '-shell-escape' ] }

Diaa

8:36 AM

Sorry for asking that early, it is 10:33 am here :)
I think I didn't say it clearly, I mean that I compiled the child file (not the parent) and only the options found in the parent (i.e. { synctex: yes} ) were considered without considering at all the options(i.e. interaction: nonstopmode) listed in the child command.

So, this line in the child file
% arara: pdflatex: { interaction: nonstopmode, files: [..\parent.tex]}
doesn't pass the option interaction: nonstopmode to the parent

Paulo Cereda

@Diaa oh it's not an issue, do not worry. :) I need to bootstrap soon. :)

@Diaa Oh sorry, I see what you mean now. I will take a closer look and report back in a minute.

[DR] (PDFLaTeX) PDFLaTeX engine
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Authors: Marco Daniel, Paulo Cereda
About to run: [ pdflatex, --interaction=nonstopmode,
..\parent.tex ]

David Carlisle

@PauloCereda it's OK you can sleep through the first too talks later.

Paulo Cereda

Looks fine to me, perhaps we need to go deeper.

@DavidCarlisle ooh let me see who are they

@DavidCarlisle ooh you are naughty

David Carlisle

@PauloCereda yes far two much

Paulo Cereda

@DavidCarlisle far too much English. :)

David Carlisle

8:45 AM

stupid interface edited previous comment instead of new one

Diaa

@PauloCereda I didn't quite understand what you mean by this output, but I am running arara v4.0 installed from TeXlive 2018, and I am not sure if it is way different from the last one.

Paulo Cereda

@Diaa Oh again, these days at Rio are quite intense, so I apologise I am being too verbose. :) Try running arara with -n and check the output, please.

@Diaa What I meant is that that particular directive did pass interaction to that other file.

Diaa

Sorry asking this type of questions :), but you mean compiling the child from command window like this
arara -n child.tex
or just editing its first line to be
%arara -n: pdflatex: { interaction: nonstopmode, files: [..\parent.tex]}
?

Faheem Mitha

9:03 AM

@HaraldHanche-Olsen Thank you. Making the signature dark enough is my current issue. I sort-of managed the transparency thing, though I'm not exactly comfortable with the GIMP.

Harald Hanche-Olsen

@FaheemMitha The gimp is full of tools to adjust the colours. Try the levels tool, or the curve tool if levels doesn't do it for you. (It's been ages since I used gimp myself.)

Faheem Mitha

@HaraldHanche-Olsen The GIMP has a positive army of tools. It's certainly not short of options.

Or should that be battalion?

As always with technical tools, the explanations of how things are done are hard to understand.

Diaa

I may be away for hours from the PC, so I made a MWE on overleaf where you can find by this link
https://v2.overleaf.com/9463521727nkrptbfhcctp

Also, the output of compiling the child file is pasted here
https://pastebin.com/tznPcYu5
where you can find that the option interaction: nonstopmode wasn't passed to the parent.

Faheem Mitha

BTW, I didn't understand the meeting that happened yesterday (or earlier today), at all. Looked like @yo' posting a bunch of stuff. I didn't actually see people talking.

I gathered it had something to do with TUG.

David Carlisle

9:20 AM

@FaheemMitha it is the tug anual meeting in rio, you can follow the talks on youtube first two today are Frank and Joseph

@FaheemMitha you can follow the talks live or catch up on old ones here youtube.com/watch?v=0afEOEX-rEM

yo'

@JosephWright Can you make a meta post featured on the main site? If so, maybe one as advertisement of the chat room and the youtube videos could be posted ...

Harald Hanche-Olsen

@FaheemMitha Here is the home page of TUG2018.

Faheem Mitha

9:35 AM

@DavidCarlisle So that stuff that @yo' was posting was a summary of the events?

@HaraldHanche-Olsen Thank you for the link.

yo'

@FaheemMitha sort of, it was a chat transcript of what was being said, as there was no stream coverage for that event.

David Carlisle

@FaheemMitha there was a panel session about pdf tagging and accessibility not in the main room so not on video @yo' was posting summaries of discussion and passing on questions

Faheem Mitha

@yo' What was being said in a meeting? In real time?

@DavidCarlisle Oh, I see.

@yo' So you're in Brazil right now?

You must have had a busy time typing.

David Carlisle

@FaheemMitha yes and joseph

Faheem Mitha

@DavidCarlisle I see.

David Carlisle

9:42 AM

@FaheemMitha in 3 hours you can watch Frank then Joseph: tug.org/tug2018/program.html

Faheem Mitha

> Boris answers: I tried contacting dozens of companies (mostly publishers) and academic bodies, saying they benefit from TeX and should support it, with very little response. Note: It's "get for free and return nothing" era now.

Sounds like truly thankless work. :-(

@DavidCarlisle Watch them live, I take it.

David Carlisle

@FaheemMitha that was from the business AGM not the accessibility panel (the AGM was also not on video)

@FaheemMitha yes

Faheem Mitha

@DavidCarlisle I understand.

What's the current price for TUG membership for a random person in India?

(Wondering if there is a Third World discount or something.)

David Carlisle

@FaheemMitha no idea:-) it is often cheaper to join via your local group so you should ask tug india, but tug india seems not to be listed anymore tug.org/tug2018/program.html

yo'

@DavidCarlisle wrong link I think :)

Faheem Mitha

9:50 AM

Do scientific publishers offer no support for TeX at all, then? Worldwide?

If so, that seems a little odd, considering how much money some of them make.

David Carlisle

@FaheemMitha basically no

Faheem Mitha

@DavidCarlisle Ok, well, what's the regular rate?

@DavidCarlisle That really is kind of nuts.

David Carlisle

@yo' sorry parallel threading model failure

Faheem Mitha

Never mind, I can check myself.

Torbjørn T.

@FaheemMitha tug.org/forms/2018/memberapp.html

David Carlisle

9:52 AM

@FaheemMitha $20 as a special promotion for the first year tug.org/join.html

Faheem Mitha

@HaraldHanche-Olsen Nice blog. But it looks like you stopped writing it a decade ago.

@DavidCarlisle That's certainly very cheap.

David Carlisle

@FaheemMitha but as mentioned in @yo's notes of the agm having that one year promitional discount didn't actually make many more people join or go to the tug meeting

Faheem Mitha

I wonder if I qualify for "citizen of country with modest economy".

Harald Hanche-Olsen

@FaheemMitha Thanks. Real life happened, no time for such activities. See also the 2005-02-15 entry. I haven't learned that lesson yet, but am improving a little bit.

Faheem Mitha

@DavidCarlisle Do you happen to know the current membership strength of TUG.

@HaraldHanche-Olsen I understand. In my experience, real life sucks. Just my experience.

Harald Hanche-Olsen

9:56 AM

@FaheemMitha Oh, it has upsides and downsides. Sometimes the downsides suck big time. Look for the upsides and enjoy them to the extent possible.

David Carlisle

@FaheemMitha the way brexit is going, I may qualify soon.

Faheem Mitha

@HaraldHanche-Olsen I read that entry.

@HaraldHanche-Olsen Sounds like good advice.

@DavidCarlisle I take it you're not a Brexit supporter, then.

Joseph Wright

10:12 AM

@yo' Is there a meta post I should pick up?

@FaheemMitha I'm on contract with ACS for author support

Faheem Mitha

10:42 AM

@JosephWright Meaning the American Chemical Society, I assume.

Do you at least get free hosting somewhere?

Joseph Wright

@FaheemMitha Yes

@FaheemMitha Huh?

Paulo Cereda

@Diaa No, it's a command line switch. :) It runs the tool in dry-run mode so you can see all the motions arara would go through in order to process your document. You can also take a look at the log file and check the command.

@DavidCarlisle: we ducks had breakfast. :)

@DavidCarlisle so how did you like our lovely surprise to you? :)

@FaheemMitha There's the student discount. That helps a lot. :)

Faheem Mitha

@JosephWright For TUG web sites, I mean.

@PauloCereda Only if you are a student.

Paulo Cereda

@FaheemMitha well, this is the discount I know of.

Faheem Mitha

@PauloCereda No, that is the same as the "modest economy" one. Though that's a vague term.

I wonder if that's a polite way of saying poor.

Paulo Cereda

10:52 AM

@FaheemMitha economically disadvantaged. :D

Joseph Wright

@FaheemMitha It's hosted by Aarhus University, I think

Faheem Mitha

@JosephWright That's nice of them.

yo'

12:11 PM

@JosephWright I thought we could create one to advertise the life stream even more

Joseph Wright

@yo' OK

yo'

@JosephWright I'll create it :)

Joseph Wright

@yo' OK: I was part-way through but just ping me and I'll feature it

yo'

1

Q: Watch the TeX Users Group 2018 conference talks online!

The TeX Users Group annual conference is happening just now in Rio de Janeiro (at the mathematics institute called IMPA). Many TeX.SE users participate and even give talks there. You can watch the talks online or check the program, also there's a dedicated chat room for related discussion. YouT...

Skillmon

Is there any neat way of making a short macro long?

Joseph Wright

12:21 PM

@yo' Featured

yo'

@JosephWright thanks

barbara beeton

12:59 PM

@FaheemMitha -- you can see the list of tug institutional members at tug.org/instmem.html . the treasurer's report from last year seems to be open: tug.org/TUGboat/tb39-1/tb121treas.pdf . somehow the number of members seems to be missing (reminder to editor -- must remember to check this), but as of the end of 2017, there were 1178 paid members. rather slender. (i'm away until this afternoon; will check back then.)

Paulo Cereda

@barbarabeeton quack!

Faheem Mitha

1:20 PM

@barbarabeeton 1178 is a really low number. That's that for TUG? Does that include other TeX groups?

I list 22 institutional members, which also seems like a really small number.

David Carlisle

@Skillmon no

Joseph Wright

1:51 PM

@FaheemMitha That's about right: DANTE is the biggest group, and I believe is around 1600 at the moment. At UK-TUG, we have <80 members.

Phelype Oleinik

@Skillmon There's this... Don't know if it's exactly what you want.

David Carlisle

2:26 PM

@Skillmon if you are using luatex then just \suppresslongerror = 1

Skillmon

2:49 PM

@PhelypeOleinik could be, but it turned out, that what I wanted doesn't work out with long definition, too.

yo'

I couldn't help myself :(

0

A: New TeX site theme coming soon

Please, decide whether: The design is professional typesetting-looking as it was before, i.e., not using sans-serif fonts, not using rounded corners, not using button-like things, boxed links etc. Or The site looks like SO in pink. The thing you propose is a mess between the two that doe...

Joseph Wright

@yo' Probably you are right: if we are having more-or-less one appearance across the network, it does need to be used sensibly

Anonymous

3:17 PM

Hi. I have a LaTeX picture titled EulerNumber(q=1).tex with Postscript (with a .tex extension i.e.). Any idea how to insert that .tex picture in a LaTeX document (obtained from gnuplot)? \includegraphics[width=8cm,height=10cm,keepaspectratio]{EulerNumber(q=1).tex} doesn't seem to work.

David Carlisle

@Blue use \input{EulerNumber(q=1)}

Anonymous

3:37 PM

@DavidCarlisle Strange. Tried, but I'm getting a big empty space in place of an image when I'm compiling with that

Anonymous

This is the file's contents:

Anonymous

% GNUPLOT: LaTeX picture with Postscript
\begingroup
\makeatletter
\providecommand\color[2][]{%
\GenericError{(gnuplot) \space\space\space\@spaces}{%
Package color not loaded in conjunction with
terminal option `colourtext'%
}{See the gnuplot documentation for explanation.%
}{Either use 'blacktext' in gnuplot or load the package
color.sty in LaTeX.}%
\renewcommand\color[2][]{}%
}%
\providecommand\includegraphics[2][]{%
\GenericError{(gnuplot) \space\space\space\@spaces}{%
Package graphicx or graphics not loaded%

Anonymous

Hmm, that itself seems erroneous

David Carlisle

@Blue you should make a complete example and ask a question on the main site code question formatting doesn't really work in chat, but it should work as long as the image file is there as well

Harald Hanche-Olsen

3:53 PM

@Blue Seriously? You have a postscript file with a .tex extension? That's asking for trouble!

Anonymous

@HaraldHanche-Olsen Could you elaborate a bit? Why is it a problem? I'm new to LaTeX stuff

David Carlisle

@HaraldHanche-Olsen no gnuplot has an option to write a eps file for the lines and overlay latex-typeset text so it makes two files a tex file that sets the text and includes the eps

@Blue @Blue it would be much simpler to get gnuplot to wriote a pdf file and simply include that (unless you need latex to typeset the text in your plot)

Harald Hanche-Olsen

@Blue Oh. @DavidCarlisle explained it. I have never used gnuplot myself, so I had no idea it worked that way. Seems weird to me.

Anonymous

@DavidCarlisle Actually I need to write the axis labels using MathJax :/ Gnuplot doesn't allow that directly

Anonymous

I do have both the .eps and .tex image files

Anonymous

3:57 PM

Not sure why it appears blank

David Carlisle

@Blue mathjax??? I doubt that works in mathjax at all.

Anonymous

@DavidCarlisle Don't know if it's called MathJax in this context. I need to include $\chi(p)$ on the y-axis label

David Carlisle

@HaraldHanche-Olsen you can only do rudimentary font choices so if you want your axis labels set buy siunitx

@Blue well you haven't said what your context is: mathjax is a latex math emulation for web pages, it does not use tex at all.

Anonymous

@DavidCarlisle Oh, I wasn't aware that it is refers only to latex math emulation for webpages, sorry

Anonymous

Anyhow, I will need $\chi(p)$ to render on the axis label. So any alternative?

David Carlisle

4:01 PM

@Blue well you could do that without tex, just use a plain text label of χ(p)

Anonymous

Gnuplot converts that to unicode as soon as I copy paste the chi symbol as normal text

David Carlisle

@Blue but the epslatex terminal output works fine, it will not just make a blank space without telling you why, what does the latex log file say?

@Blue unicode is normal text:-)

Anonymous

@DavidCarlisle Nothing at all! You could have a look at the source code here: sharelatex.com/9289586353jffqwztghhtg (line 30)

Anonymous

@DavidCarlisle I mean in the graph label it shows U+2199 or something like that

David Carlisle

@Blue apparently not without a password. As I said before you can make a small test example and post it as a question here. But a log file never says nothing at all, there will always be several dozen lines

Anonymous

4:05 PM

Instead of chi

David Carlisle

@Blue even if you use a terminal such as pdf?

Anonymous

@DavidCarlisle I haven't tried the pdf terminal. Checking

David Carlisle

@HaraldHanche-Olsen did you ever use xfig? That had a very similar eps+picture mode output option

Faheem Mitha

@JosephWright To be clear, the 1178 is for TUG then? And TUG is international, right?

Anonymous

@DavidCarlisle Well, here's the code (see line 30) if you wish to see it without making a password. And here is the .tex image file. And here's a screenshot of the log:

Anonymous

4:13 PM

Anonymous

Just making sure that I'm not making any careless errors before posting on the main site

Anonymous

Even if I use \input{EulerNumber(q=1)} instead of \input{EulerNumber(q=1).tex}, the image doesn't show up

marmot

4:29 PM

@Blue Do you have an eps or png version of the file? If not, consider producing one. If that does not work, you could use e.g. pgfplots to produce the plot. pgfplots can also plot gnuplot stuff (but I do not have any detailed knowledge on this). Generally, you'll be better of if you ask a question on the main site (including an MWE).

Anonymous

@marmot I do have a .png version but the image quality gets ruined if I use .png, after compiling in PDFLaTeX

Joseph Wright

@FaheemMitha Yes

Anonymous

And gnuplot cannot produce independent .eps images it seems

Anonymous

It always has an additional .tex dependency

Anonymous

So, while I'm more familiar with gnuplot, perhaps I need to shift to something else :/

marmot

4:32 PM

@Blue I don't know much about gnuplots itself. All I know is that this figure is so simple that it can easily be produced with pgfplots or even TikZ "only".

Anonymous

And I don't know much about pgfplots or Tikz :P

Anonymous

Gotta read up

marmot

@Blue If you tell me the equation for the curve I could try to write the pgfplot version before dinner, but as I said there is nothing wrong asking on the main site, then you could be lucky and get a really good answer by @TorbjørnT. who just entered this chat room ;-)

Anonymous

@marmot Well, they aren't equations but rather data files with two columns

Anonymous

I could send you the data files though

marmot

4:36 PM

@Blue Please ask a question on the main site such that the next generation of Blues don't need to go through the process but just look up the question. ;-)

Anonymous

Haha, okaies :)

Torbjørn T.

@Blue Doesn't the postscript terminal produce standalone eps? set terminal postscript eps

Harald Hanche-Olsen

@DavidCarlisle I sure did, quite a lot in fact, but that was mostly in the previous millenium, I think. And I do not remember that particular output option at all.

@Blue There's a bit of a learning curve there.

Faheem Mitha

6:02 PM

@Blue Yes, gnuplot probably isn't an optimal choice. And why do you want to produce eps images?

David Carlisle

6:22 PM

@Blue you used \include so of course that forces a page break, don't do that, use \input

Anonymous

@DavidCarlisle Tried it, still doesn't work :/

Anonymous

@FaheemMitha eps images are supposedly of better quality (and preserve quality when zoomed in)

Faheem Mitha

@Blue I think that's what vector graphics do.

percusse

7:12 PM

Should we ask a question about the design mistakes in the new Stackexchange templates in graphicsdesign.SE ?

6

Recursive lamenting :D

David Carlisle

@Blue "doesn't work" isn't a useful characterization, make a test file and post the error log on a question on the main site

@Blue same would be true of pdf

Harald Hanche-Olsen

@Blue but just to muddy the waters here, both eps and pdf formats are capable of containing raster images, which will lose quality when you zoom in. (Not that this is likely to be the case in your application.)

David Carlisle

@percusse I'm still waiting for egreg to show me how to ask a question.

Harald Hanche-Olsen

7:27 PM

@DavidCarlisle Why don't you ask on meta how to do it?

David Carlisle

@HaraldHanche-Olsen egreg has managed to ask a question on meta, he should do it

Harald Hanche-Olsen

@DavidCarlisle clever guy.

Faheem Mitha

8:02 PM

@DavidCarlisle I suppose the point of joining TUG is to support TeX, not because the membership is actually useful.

Though I don't know it is actually useful or not.

Is everyone here a member?

Stefan Kottwitz

25

Q: What are the benefits of joining TUG, the TeX Users Group?

As a member of TUG, the TeX Users Group, I recently received an email about a new membership drive in hopes of reversing the trend of a slowly declining membership. I know one can learn more about TUG on their website and can read the membership form online. I also know that I enjoy reading TUGBo...

tugboat

David Carlisle

@FaheemMitha yes more or less, but then in that case an institution like a publisher or big university could/should pay more than a few hundred poor students writing their thesis will ever pay, and that is the problem, it is hard to justify a user group to a publisher and it is hard to justify paying for a user. So Tug needs to decide what it wants to be.

Joseph Wright

9:03 PM

@DavidCarlisle Came up at the AGM ...

@DavidCarlisle Talk to Boris!

Faheem Mitha

@DavidCarlisle I'm not sure exactly what you mean. This looks like a comment that wants to be an essay.

It doesn't seem to be that supporting TeX really should require justification, in a sane world.

Scientific publishers, at least some of them, make obscene amounts of money, and could easily afford to support the modest needs of the TeX user and development communities without breaking a sweat.

But I suppose this is part of the generally broken financial model of free software. Where billion dollar corporations depend on the efforts of some nameless person slaving away in his garage for $40,000 a year, or whatever it is.

And the only time anyone notices is when there is a security breach.

David Carlisle

9:25 PM

@FaheemMitha yes that's what I mean. they could, but mostly they'd be interested in supporting a development group, but a "user group" traditionally implies a group providing end user support. TUG needs to deside if it's an end user group that needs to attract more end users or if it's a development funding organisation, in which case it needs to find more funds

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$TeX - LaTeX$ TeX, LaTeX and Friends