## Springer recommends eqnarray

I just read on LaTeX-Community.org, that the publisher Springer still recommends to use eqnarray. I could not believe that, so I went to Book Manuscript Guidelines, choose Manuscript Preparation in LaTeX and downloaded svmult.zip, which contains the Springer class for contributed books, proceedings, and similar. It has a folder called templates, which contains a file author.tex. In this file I could read:

... % Use this file as a template for your own input. ... Use the standard \verb|equation| environment to typeset your equations, e.g. % \begin{equation} a \times b = c\;, \end{equation} % however, for multiline equations we recommend to use the \verb|eqnarray| environment\footnote{In physics texts please activate the class option \texttt{vecphys} to depict your vectors in \textbf{\itshape boldface-italic} type - as is customary for a wide range of physical subjects}. \begin{eqnarray} a \times b = c \nonumber\\ \vec{a} \cdot \vec{b}=\vec{c} \label{eq:01} \end{eqnarray}

A close look shows this template doesn’t even align at the relation symbol, which could be done with eqnarray. The example equations are simply right aligned. One could see that in the output if one of those equations would be extended.

eqnarray is considered to be obsolete and faulty, as I wrote 2008 in the comparison eqnarray vs. align. Actually it’s been obsolete since the amsmath package appeared. The better ways are described in its manual, such as using align, gather or multline.

I’m sure most experienced LaTeX users know that fact, and LaTeX beginners are told this frequently in forums and Usenet groups. Why it does not reach Springer? Perhaps this publisher doesn’t really welcome LaTeX for scientific publishing and doesn’t care if his templates are outdated. I wonder what they use then.

06. April 2012 by stefan