My latex environment
This post is backed up from my old blog and was posted at 2013-10-28.
Some days ago, my fellow students asked me about my LaTeX environment. Since some years all of my papers for school or university are written with LaTeX. Especially when it comes to larger writing, I love the capabilities of LaTeX. Over time, my template changed to support more features. Currently, beside the standard LaTeX features, it supports:
- Different kinds of listings (Table of contents, list of abbreviations, list of tables, list of listings, glossary)
- ToDo annotations
- Bibliography with German DIN 1502 style
- Source code syntax coloring
- long line wrapping (although it is currently a bit buggy :-))
- line numbering
- captions, boxing and page breaks
Take a look at the Studienarbeit.pdf.
For this, I use MiKTeX x64 together with TeXstudio. You can find the document template on GitHub (currently it is for the cooperative state university Baden-Württemberg Karlsruhe)
To compile the template, you need have to install the following requirements:
- Python + pygments (for the syntax coloring)
- Perl (for the glossary and abbreviations)
Installation
This part covers the installation of my LaTeX environment. The installation is done on a Windows 8.1 system.
At first you need to install MiKTeX and TeXstudio. Both of them are very self-explanatory.
Python + Pygments
To install pygments, you need to install Python at first. Just download the installer and run it. After that, you need to install easy_install at first, which makes it really easy to install pygments. Download the script and run it. To install Pygments just type
easy_install Pygments
into a console.
Perl
For Perl I use ActivePerl x64. Just run the installer and you are done.
Side note: You maybe need to adjust your PATH variable by yourself, so the perl and python interpreters can be found.
Add this to your PATH variable:
C:\Perl64\site\bin;C:\Perl64\bin;C:\Python33\;C:\Python33\Scripts\
Configuration
To compile this template correctly you need to stick to this order:
- run pdflatex (make sure to use the flag “–shell-escape”, otherwise minted will not work and produce a warning)
- run makeglossaries (I use texindy as indexing tool)
- run bibliography (I use bibtex)
- run pdflatex twice (for correct labels and references)
If you use TeXstudio too, you can define your own compile command. Go to options -> configure TeXstudio…-> build. Create a new “User Command” there with this as the command:
txs:///pdflatex | txs:///makeglossary | txs:///bibliography | txs:///pdflatex | txs:///pdflatex
You should now be able to compile the template and produce nice documents for your works. ;-)
Feel free to leave a comment if you need further help.