[texhax] (no subject)

[William Adams]

On Oct 9, 2013, at 5:33 PM, Aaron Corbet wrote:

> 1) I am not, nor can I be, connected to the Internet. I communicate with you via one of our libraries. Therefore, I need to be assured, once again, that I need no such connection to run this software for producing professional papers. I don't care about optional sub-programs.

AIUI, the only time it makes such a connection is if one turns on the _option_ of automatically loading uninstalled packages.

> 2) I am using Windows XP in my computer. I seem to recall your stating somewhere that I MAY need some special Windows sub-program installed, in order to get your stuff to work. How do I tell if I have this, and if I don't where do I get it?

I'm still using Windows XP on my main machine and I've never needed anything special to run TeX on Windows --- could you quote the relevant text? The only thing which seems possible is if you'd have to d/l and install some set of DLLs or .NET.

> 3) Your Protext layout seems a great improvement on the WinEdt stuff I have been  using. But I need some kind of trouble-shooting guideline. I am sure I will have to buy one or more of your technical manuals, as I previously (20 years ago) found to be essential. Do I do this through this website, or elsewhere?

I don't think there's such a document. Starting at: http://www.tug.org/protext/ the only link is to: http://www.tug.org/begin.html

I guess the ideal would be if we could up-date Norman Walsh's _Making TeX Work_ which is sadly out-dated, but freely available here: http://makingtexwork.sourceforge.net/mtw/

There is of course Robin's fabulous FAQ: http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html --- I suspect that many of your questions will already have answers there. There is a .pdf version: http://www.tex.ac.uk/ctan/help/uk-tex-faq/newfaq.pdf and I suspect there's already a copy on your DVD --- I suspect the most efficient use of your time will be to read through all the relevant docs on that first.

> 4) In the interim, is there such an abbreviated trouble-shooting manual in what I already have?

If I remember correctly, ProTeXt uses MiKTeX at its core: http://www.miktex.org/help

> 5) To begin at the beginning, do I need to specify, at the start of my articles, any "use" of font packages, ANSI installation, etc? Or is there a default setting for this?

The default AIUI is 7-bit encoding using Computer Modern fonts. You'll want to read up on the packages:

 - fontenc - http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/664/why-should-i-use-usepackaget1fontenc
 - inputenc - http://www.dickimaw-books.com/latex/novices/html/inputenc.html
 - lmodern - http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html?label=uselmfonts

(those may not be the best links, and you should consult the package documentation in addition)

Please try typing ``texdoc <foo>'' into a command-line terminal to see if that loads the documentation.

Alternately, look through the DVD and see if there's anything in the documentation tree of interest. If you need to install a general purpose .pdf viewer, I'd suggest Sumatra: http://blog.kowalczyk.info/software/sumatrapdf/free-pdf-reader.html

> 6) I notice there does not seem to be any provision for stating "affiliation" after my name. Do I include this in "name" after a linebreak? Or what?

http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/9594/adding-more-than-one-author-with-different-affiliation

(I think you want Sony's answer)

> 7) There are a bunch of little downward-pointing arrowheads beside various line numbers. Do each of these mark some kind of error? Or are these something more general?

I believe that those are ``disclosure triangles'' and allow ``code folding'' --- just a guess though, since I don't know what editor you're using.

> 8) Perhaps most important, you seem to have a function available to provide a preview of (.pdf?) final text, for highlighted regions of the .tex  compilation. I can't get this to work at all. Is there some extra mumbo-jumbo?

Which editor / previewing combination are you using? Please provide a compleat description of:

 - what tool you're using
 - what your input file was
 - what steps you took
 - if there were any warning messages and what they were

If you haven't tried TeXworks, I'd strongly suggest trying it: http://www.tug.org/texworks/

William

-- 
William Adams
senior graphic designer
Fry Communications
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.