TeXblog

Bugfix in pstricks-add

If you’re using pstricks-add or a package requiring it consider updating it if its version is lower than 3.34. The version 3.34 has been released some days ago and brings a bugfix for the pstScalePoints macro. The bug could look like the one discussed today in “problem with pstricks and psset” on LaTeX-Community.org where v3.32 has been used.

Further the macro psMatrixPlot has been modified in v3.34 and is now able to plot a matrix of n² values as an intensity plot.

03. June 2009 by stefan
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New package tabularew: centering multicolumn headings

In standard tabular environments multicolumn headings will be aligned to the left when they are wider then the text below, even if they contain a “c” as format parameter. Here’s a very small demonstration example:

\documentclass[a4paper,10pt]{article}
\usepackage{eurosym}
\begin{document}
\begin{tabular}{r@{.}l}
\multicolumn{2}{c}{Price in \euro} \\
  \hline
  79 & 50 \\
   9 & 85 \\
  10 & 00
\end{tabular}
\end{document}

Output:

The tabularew package by Diego Saba solves this problem by introducing new commands for modifying the horizontal alignment. The example above can be changed to:

\documentclass[a4paper,10pt]{article}
\usepackage{eurosym}
\usepackage{tabularew}
\begin{document}
\begin{tabularew}{>{\spew{.5}{+1}}r@{.}l}
\multicolumn{2}{c}{Price in \euro} \\
  \hline
  79 & 50 \\
   9 & 85 \\
  10 & 00
\end{tabularew}
\end{document}

Output:

The command \spew and the tabularew environment are explained in the package documentation.

03. June 2009 by stefan
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New introduction: Getting something out of LaTeX

Jim Hefferon has published the document “Getting something out of LaTeX” on CTAN, taking new LaTeX user through making a first document. The author wants to give a quick taste, the reader could get an idea if the LaTeX system could help him and how it’s working.

The article contains information about getting the software, using an editor, compiling, handling errors and writing math. It comes with some source code examples and recommendations for tutorials.

26. May 2009 by stefan
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Asymptote released on CTAN

Asymptote is a powerful descriptive vector graphics language useful for for technical drawing, using LaTeX for high-quality output. It’s not just a graphics program but a programming language. Asymptote is inspired by MetaPost but provides C++-like syntax. It runs on Linux, UNIX, MacOS and Windows. In a very mathematically oriented way you can create 2D and 3D graphics, here’s just a small example coming with the program:

Now it’s been released on CTAN, 19 May 2009.

For more information visit:

• the Asymptote package on CTAN,
• the Asymptote homepage.
  The homepage contains also
  • a gallery,
  • documentation,
  • Answers to frequently asked questions (FAQ),
  • a discussion forum and more.
• the forum Asymptote and GeoGebra on artofproblemsolving.com,
• the Asymptote Wiki also on AoPS,
• the Asymptote example gallery.

Asymptote can be used easily within LaTeX documents. There’s a good introduction by Dario Teixeira: Asymptote and LaTeX: An Integration Guide.

There are even more resources you can find if you follow those selected links.

20. May 2009 by stefan
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MiKTeX Portable Edition released

Yesterday Christian Schenk has released the portable edition of MiKTeX 2.8 beta3. This edition allows to use MiKTeX on portable storage devices like USB sticks or flash cards for use on any Windows (2000/XP/Vista/7) computer. Using Portable MiKTeX leaves no traces on the host computer, no administrator privileges would be needed. Visit miktex.org/portable for more information and download.

17. May 2009 by stefan
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New packages and updates on CTAN in May

New packages on CTAN:

• ulqda – supports the integration of Qualitative Data Analysis research tasks with LaTeX, assists in the analysis of textual data by providing macros used to markup textual information. ulqda is requiring pdfeTeX, further it’s needing the packages soul, color, multicols, pgf/TikZ, dot2texi and for processing and graph/list generation the external tools GraphViz, dot2tex, Perl and the Digest::SHA1 module. The author is Ivan Griffin, for further information have a look at its documentation.
• lshort-mongol – another translation of Tobias Oetiker’s Not so short introduction, this time to Mongolian by Dorjgotov Batumongke.
• pst-gantt – drawing GANTT charts, by Herbert Voß, requiring PSTricks, see documentation.
• logical-markup-utils – contains two packages by Micha? Mas?owski for inserting language-dependent inline quotes and dashes, see README file.
• figbas – fonts by Bob Tennent for figured-bass notation in music, see README and example.
• draftmark – putting user-defined draft marks (“watermarks”) on selected pages, by Ahmed Musa, highly customizable, requires the atbegshi package, see documentation and example.
• tolkienfonts – fonts for writing J.R.R. Tolkien’s languages with pdfTeX, see documentation, by Ariel Barton.

Updates on CTAN:

• libertine – new version of the libertine font for LaTeX and XeLaTeX)
• diagmac2 – additional macros and expanded documentation
• tikz-timing – bugfix, syntax change, some additions and improvements, see Change History in its documentation
• hyphen-spanish – some fixed patterns
• tablor – bugfix
• fonttable – improved aid for font designers and testers, another method for font selection
• VnTeX – enhanced documentation, bugfixes in fonts, internal improvements
• pst-math – now able to solve linear equation systems
• pstricks-add – new macro psTangentLine, matching new pst-math version
• MetaPost – supporting SVG graphics generation, providing access to PostScript Type1 font curves from within MetaPost, bugfixes, improved manual and tutorial
• BibTexMng – new features, see README file for the list
• biblatex-dw – bugfix and improvements, see CHANGES file
• fge font – fixing garbled dvips output with PostScript version of the font
• TeXcount – support added for handling Unicode (UTF-8) encoded documents, now being able to handle non-Latin alphabets, providing special options for counting the characters of Chinese and Japanese texts
• achemso – “email” option to prevent printing e-mails, bugfix for non-superscript citations, improved compatibility to v3.1 configuration files
• fancytooltips – bugfix
• CircuiTikz – support added for op-amps, new options arrowmos and noarrowmos for drawing arrows in pmos and nmos
• svn-prov – new macro DefineFileInfoSVN, defining the version, revision, date and info text of the package, class or file as macros

Information about new packages and updates before Mai 1st (and of course newer too) can be found in the ctan-ann archive.

17. May 2009 by stefan
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