What’sinthebook?
PartIisMissionImpossible;ithelpsyoutogetstartedquicklywithLaTeX,totypeyour
firstarticles,tomakeyourfirstpresentations,anditpreparesyoutotackleLaTeXinmore
depthinthesubsequentparts.
Chapter1istheShortCourse.Youstartwritingyourfirstarticle—astypeseton
page4—andprepareyourfirstpresentation—seesomeoftheslidestypesetonpage26.
ThischapterintroduceshowLaTeXusesthekeyboardandhowtotypetext.Youdonot
needtolearnmuchtounderstandthebasics.Textmarkupisquiteeasy.Youalsolearn
mathmarkup,whichisnotsostraightforward.Severalsectionsinthischaptereaseyou
intomathematicaltypesetting.Thereisasectiononthebasicbuildingblocksofmath
formulas.Anotheronediscussesequations.Finally,wepresentthetwosimplestmultiline
formulas,whichshouldcovermostofyoureverydayneeds.Wealsocovertheelementsof
presentationswithasimpleexample.
InChapter2,weexplainhowthingswork,thestructureofLaTeX,theauxiliary
files,thelogicalandvisualdesignofanarticle,LaTeXerrormessages.Finally,wepresent
alonglistofdosanddon’ttohelpyouwritegoodLaTeX.
PartIIintroducesthetwomostbasicskillsforwritingwithLaTeXindepth,typing
textandtypingmath.
Chapters3and4introducetextanddisplayedtext.Chapter3isespeciallyimportant
because,whenyoutypeaLaTeXdocument,mostofyourtimeisspenttypingtext.The
topicscoveredincludespecialcharactersandaccents,hyphenation,fonts,and
spacing.Chapter4coversdisplayedtext,includinglistsandtables,andforthe
mathematician,proclamations(theorem-likestructures)andproofs.
Typingmathistheheartofanymathematicaltypesettingsystem.Chapter5discusses
inlineformulasindetail,includingbasicconstructs,delimiters,operators,mathaccents,
andhorizontallystretchablelines.ThechapterconcludeswiththeFormulaGallery.
MathsymbolsarecoveredinthreesectionsinChapter6.Howtospacethem,howto
buildnewones;weintroducethenewsetofsome2,000STIXmathsymbols.Wealso
lookatthecloselyrelatedsubjectsofmathalphabetsandfonts.Thenwediscusstagging
andgroupingequations.
LaTeXknowsalotabouttypesettinganinlineformula,butnotmuchabouthowto
displayamultilineformula.Chapter7presentsthenumeroustoolsLaTeXofferstohelp
youdothat.WestartwithaVisualGuidetohelpyougetoriented.
PartIIIdiscussesthepartsofaLaTeXdocument.InChapter8,youlearnaboutthe
structureofaLaTeXdocument.Themostimportanttopicsaresectioningandcross-
referencing.InChapter9,wediscusstheamsartdocumentclassforarticles.
Inparticular,Ipresentthetitlepageinformation.Chapter9alsofeaturessecondarticle.tex,a
samplearticleforamsart,somewhatmoreadvancedthanfirstarticle.textypesetonpage4.You
canlearnalotaboutLaTeXjustbyreadingthesourcefileoneparagraphatatimeand
seeinghowthatparagraphistypeset.Weconcludethischapterwithabriefdescriptionof
theAMSdistribution,thepackagesanddocumentclasses,ofwhichamsartisapart.