Interesting TeX-related URLs

This is a list compiled for the TeX Users Group by Sebastian Rahtz, with the help of Michel Goossens and Barbara Beeton, and many helpful people who sent in corrections. More contributions welcome!

Don Knuth

Donald Knuth 's home page
  1. National TeX Users Groups
  2. FAQ, documentation
  3. CTAN interfaces
  4. Free or shareware TeX implementations
  5. Commercial TeX vendors
  6. Packages and programs
  7. Projects
  8. TeX on the Web, and related software
  9. Publications
  10. Publishers
  11. Miscellaneous
  12. Related text-processing

Frequently asked questions, and documentation

If you have a general question, you should start with the Frequently Asked Questions prepared by the UK TeX Users Group; this is also available formatted in various forms for ftp on CTAN .

German speakers should look at the German FAQ from DANTE
(can be fetched using FTP from here ), while French speakers will find much useful material on The LaTeX Navigator

Some important `standardization' documents you should beware of are

If you have problems with LaTeX, check the LaTeX 2e home page, and the LaTeX bugs database: ,a searchable back log of bugs and fixes

For some general help with LaTeX commands etc, look at

Online help for other bits of TeX software:
  • Plain TeX , from Norm Walsh at O'Reilly
  • BibTeX , from Norm Walsh at O'Reilly
  • Make Index , from Norm Walsh at O'Reilly
  • SliTeX , from Norm Walsh at O'Reilly
  • Reference cards for AMSTeX and Plain TeX by Joseph Silverman
  • AMS LaTeX Tutorial by Tom Scavo

    Another useful document is Word-processor to LaTeX convertors, a small FAQ maintained by Wilfried Hennings about converting word-processor packages to LaTeX

    Don't forget the newsgroup comp.text.tex if you have queries not answered above, its full of knowledgeable people.

    CTAN interfaces

    The Comprehensive TeX Archive Network (CTAN) is the primary repository for all free TeX-related material. There are various Web search engines, including
    CTAN Search by Peter Flynn
    DANTE CTAN Index
    CTAN-Web Home Page
    Index of /tex-archive/ on ftp.tex.ac.uk

    Specifically for macro packages, look at the catalogue by Graham Williams, available in various places:

    Free or shareware TeX implementations

    Web2c , Karl Berry's monumental and widely-used system for compiling all the important TeX software in C
    teTeX , Thomas Esser's packaging of Web2c for many Unix systems
    OzTeX for the Macintosh, by Andrew Trevorrow
    CMacTeX for Macintosh, by Tom Kiffe
    NTeX (Linux TeX)
    MikTeX, a highly-regarded setup for Windows 95/NT
    TeXgX , a Macintosh TeX (shareware) by Jonathan Kew that can access the sophisticated features of GX fonts (such as automatic ligatures, contextual swashes, etc)
    Gary Gray maintains a full Web page for Macintosh TeX and LaTeX stuff.

    The AMS TeX pages have a full list of TeX implementations and sources.

    Commercial TeX vendors

    TCI Software Research
    Personal TeX Inc
    Y&Y Inc Home Page: TeX systems for Windows, also the makers of the Lucida families of PostScript fonts.
    Blue Sky Research
    True TeX
    general list of vendors (including some without Web connections)

    Packages and programs

    AASTeX (Version4.0 as of May 1995) (see also AASTeX FAQ )
    AMS-TeX and AMS-LaTeX , the American Mathematical Society's TeX packages
    CSTeX, LaTeX and plain TeX support for Czech and Slovak users, including special fonts
    EDMAC , Dominik Wujastyk and John Lavagnino's package for typestting critical editions
    Eplain , Karl Berry's extended plain format
    Feynmf , Thorsten Ohl's package for doing Feynman diagrams using LaTeX and Metafont/Metapost
    Harvard package for bibliographies in LaTeX , by Peter Williams
    PSTricks Notes by Denis Girou (including bug list)
    The REVTeX package
    Seminar (LaTeX slides), notes by Denis Girou (including bug list and FAQ)
    XYpic , Kristoffer Rose and Ross Moore's graphics package, specialising in commutative diagrams

    AUC-TeX ,a sophisticated Emacs mode for TeX
    BibDB , a BibTeX Database Manager (DOS and Windows) by Eyal Doron
    dvips , Tom Rokicki's widely-used dvi to PostScript driver
    EMTEXGI , a Windows interface for emTeX
    Excalibur , the Mac TeX-aware spell checker
    Metapost ,John Hobby's version of Metafont that makes EPS files
    stepTeX , porting the famous NeXTStep TeX previewer
    xdvi , Paul Vojta's widely-used X Windows TeX previewer
    Xindy ,a new index processor designed to replace makeindex
    xtem_TeXmenu , X11 GUI for TeX and LaTeX

    TeX future projects

    LaTeX 3 , the successor to LaTeX (one day)
    e-TeX , extended TeX
    Omega , Unicode-based TeX

    TeX on the Web, and related software

    HyperTeX , conventions for TeX hypertext

    ASTER demo (spoken mathematics)
    The Hyperlatex package
    IDVI , Garth Dickie's WEB dvi browser in Java
    LaTeX to HTML
    ltoh , Russel Quong's customizable LaTeX to HTML converter
    IBM Techexplorer Hypermedia Browser
    TeX4ht , TeX and LaTeX for Hypertext, by Eitan Gurari
    WebEQ a Java Equation viewer

    Publications

    TeX-related bibibliographical collections maintained by Nelson Beebe
    Cahiers Gutenberg

    Publishers

    American Institute of Physics (see REVTeX below)
    American Astronomical Society (see ASSTeX below)
    TeX and LaTeX Macros for astronomers from STScI
    AMS , American Mathematical Society

    Miscellaneous fun

    Shyster , James Popple's case-based legal expert system which produces LaTeX output
    International Ispell , the sophisticated interactive spell checker that understands TeX markup
    Nelson Beebe's home page
    TeX crazy page
    Metafont --> GIF
    LaTeX in Portuguese
    block diagrams
    LaTeX highlighting in emacs

    Related text-processing

    Some pointers to the wider context (SGML etc):
    Michel Goossen's text-processing page
    SGML Web Page
    The Wider World of SGML on the Web
    A list of Typography, Calligraphy & Type-Related Books by Delve Withrington

    Sebastian Rahtz,

    Last modified: April 25th 1997

    Please send comments to s.rahtz@elsevier.co.uk

    Or look at Sebastian's daughter Matilde in the Protestant Cemetery, Rome (225k GIF image, watch out).