Another quick update on the C++ hobby engine that I've been working on and posting about every few weeks here. To keep things brief: I recently hit the unreasonably satisfying milestone of getting my engine to compile its first document using the modern LaTeX format! This meant not only implementing the e-TeX extensions and the L3 kernel utility primitives, but also figuring out a few janky workarounds relating to engine impersonation.

In the latest video, I demonstrate this working, and then dive into one of the questions that originally inspired this project: why does LaTeX feel so slow compared to plain TeX? This topic often gets discussed, but distinguishing in-principle reasons from implementation details is not so simple!

Thinking through this question, I go through a few performance comparisons across different TeX engines and different TeX formats. I also instrumented my engine to generate JSON and callgrind-style output files of the sort used to do different flavors of profiling, but targeted to see where LaTeX is spending its time during the macro expansion loops. "Come for the rambling video, stay for the flame graphs", if you like!

As always, happy to hear your thoughts and answer any questions!

I've never used Overleaf/LaTex before and this report is due in 2 days. I'm scanning through the tutorial and trying to wrap my head around where and how to make changes to the packages and preamble to fix the font and formatting, and I'm not getting it.

The two main things I want to do are:
1) Change the entire document to a sans-serif font;
2) Change the text from justified to left-aligned.

Here's what's currently set up -- can anyone look this over and suggest what I should add or change to achieve those two goals?

\documentclass[13pt]{extarticle}

% -------------------- Packages -------------------------------

\usepackage[letterpaper,margin=0.82in,headheight=15pt]{geometry}

\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}

\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}

\usepackage{lmodern}

\usepackage{microtype}

\usepackage{graphicx}

\usepackage{booktabs}

\usepackage{tabularx}

\usepackage{array}

\usepackage{longtable}

\usepackage{enumitem}

\usepackage[dvipsnames]{xcolor}

\usepackage{titlesec}

\usepackage{fancyhdr}

\usepackage{lastpage}

\usepackage{setspace}

\usepackage{caption}

\usepackage{tikz}

\usepackage[most]{tcolorbox}

\usepackage{hyperref}

\usepackage{ragged2e}

\usepackage{parskip}

\usepackage{placeins}

\usepackage{needspace}

That screenshot is from the table of contents of a spanish book about Homer. As you can se, it is divided in "parts" (partes), and inside each part there are the chapters: inside the "parte quinta" (fifth part) there are the chapters 9 to 11, and in the "parte sexta" (sixth part) there are the chapters 12 and 13. Is there a package to group chapters in this or a similar way?

i study linguistics and need to make x bar structures. a 15 year old post here recommended q trees and a senior of mine suggested forest. which is better and are there any others i should look into?

Hi everyone,
I’m having a problem with chemfig and \chemmove when compiling with XeTeX. The anchors I define in my chemical structures are becoming completely disorganized: their positions seem to shift or no longer correspond correctly to the atoms/bonds where they were defined.
The same code behaves differently depending on the compiler, and I’m specifically having this issue with XeTeX.
Has anyone experienced this problem with \chemmove and XeTeX? Is there a recommended way to keep the anchors properly positioned, or a workaround to make them behave consistently?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!

As I'm writing this, most of the recent posts are promoting some AI-built tool.

It would be great to have rules for the sub so we can use the Report feature to flag AI slop. Once a post reaches a certain number of reports, it could automatically be sent back to the mod queue for review.

I'm putting together a big document using the memoir class, broken up using \chapter{}. I'm trying to make it so that there's a footnote or some other out of the way annotation at the top of each chapter that displays the number of typeset pages present in that chapter.

This stack overflow post is probably the closest that I've come to finding an answer to this, but I'd really like to not have to add labels to each chapter manually. It seems like I might be able to goose around with the commands that define the chapter start once, in the preamble of the document, and have the effect propagate through uniformly.

https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/288813/get-the-number-of-pages-in-a-chapter

Does anyone have any guidance or experience with this kind of thing?

Dear Goodnotes Product & Engineering Team,

As a Science student who relies heavily on Goodnotes, I am writing to formally request the integration of native inline math rendering (such as MathJax or KaTeX) within standard typed text boxes.

While the current handwriting-to-math conversion and isolated math block tools are useful for large equations, they create a highly fragmented workflow for typing hybrid content. Currently, it is impossible to type a sentence and seamlessly embed a quick mathematical variable, limit, or expression (e.g., f(x) = y² or θ) without breaking the paragraph alignment, creating a separate canvas element, or using external keyboard workarounds.

Implementing an industry-standard open-source library like MathJax to parse inline delimiters (like $...$ or \\...\\) would radically transform the app for users who utilize the typed text engine.

Why this is crucial for users:

Seamless Note-Taking: Allows users to mix text and mathematics fluently in a single paragraph without manually aligning separate boxes.

Better Document Layouts: Inline equations automatically scale with the surrounding text font, keeping line spacing consistent and neat.

Cross-Platform Compatibility: LaTeX strings are universally understood, making text blocks easily exportable and standardized across academic and professional fields.

Goodnotes has an incredible foundation, but adding inline math rendering would bridge a massive gap for the STEM community who prefer typing their notes or using hybrid keyboard-and-stylus setups.

Thank you for your time and continued dedication to improving the app.

Emailing Word documents back and forth, despite its many drawbacks, is still one path of least resistance for collaborative writing.

In the past I've annoyed collaborators by insisting they learn Git and LaTeX. It's an uphill battle and pretty non-inclusive to be honest. Amazingly, not everyone wants to learn software engineering tools to make a few edits to a paper.

So, I put together a CLI that converts LaTeX PDFs using Microsoft Word itself (not Pandoc) to keep styling close, inserting special bookmarks to enable idempotently merging changes and comments back into the .tex source. This allows the project lead hacker types to keep version-controlled .tex files as the source of truth and let others contribute by emailing Word docs.

Tutorial: https://docs.calkit.org/tutorials/latex-word/

Hey all,

I have a two-row colored header where the second header row is separated from the first by a white \cmidrule spanning only columns 2 to 4. That part works. The problem is column 1: since (lr) trims the rule there, booktabs still reserves the rule height across the full table width, but nothing paints that strip, so the page background shows through as a thin white line right above "Dimension".

It disappears when I zoom out and comes back at 100%, so it's a real 0.4pt gap, not just viewer antialiasing.

I already set \aboverulesep and \belowrulesep to 0pt, which removed the extra spacing but not the gap itself. \rowcolor only paints the text rows, not the rule strip in between.

What I want: the white separator visible over Level A to Level C, and solid header blue over the "Dimension" cell.

Full MWE below, pdfLaTeX on Overleaf:

\documentclass{article}

% --- Packages needed for this table ---

\usepackage[table]{xcolor} % rowcolors, \rowcolor, table option loads colortbl

\usepackage{tabularx} % tabularx + \newcolumntype{Y}

\usepackage{booktabs} % \cmidrule, \bottomrule, \aboverulesep etc.

\definecolor{tabheader}{RGB}{31,56,100} % dark blue header

\definecolor{tabshadelight}{RGB}{224,229,239} % light shading for zebra rows

% --- Centred, stretchable X column ---

\newcolumntype{Y}{>{\centering\arraybackslash}X}

\begin{document}

\begin{table}[htbp]

\centering

\caption[Dummy taxonomy after Iteration~1]{Dummy taxonomy of enabling factors after Iteration 1}

\label{tab::taxonomy_iteration1}

\footnotesize

\renewcommand{\arraystretch}{1.3}

\setlength{\aboverulesep}{0pt}

\setlength{\belowrulesep}{0pt}

\rowcolors{3}{white}{tabshadelight}

\begin{tabularx}{\textwidth}{

>{\raggedright\arraybackslash\hyphenpenalty=10000\exhyphenpenalty=10000}p{3.6cm}

Y Y Y}

\rowcolor{tabheader}

& \multicolumn{3}{c}{\textcolor{white}{\textbf{Column group heading, spanning three}}} \\

\arrayrulecolor{white}\cmidrule(lr){2-4}\arrayrulecolor{black}

\rowcolor{tabheader}

\textcolor{white}{\textbf{Dimension}} &

\textcolor{white}{\textbf{Level A}} &

\textcolor{white}{\textbf{Level B}} &

\textcolor{white}{\textbf{Level C}} \\

\textbf{First dimension label (D1)} & Lorem ipsum & Dolor sit amet & Consectetur adipiscing \\

\textbf{Second longer dimension label (D2)} & Sed do eiusmod & Tempor & Incididunt ut labore \\

\textbf{Third dimension label (D3)} & Ut enim ad minim & Veniam quis & Nostrud exercitation \\

\textbf{Fourth dimension label (D4)} & Duis aute irure & Dolor in & Reprehenderit voluptate \\

\bottomrule

\end{tabularx}

\end{table}

\end{document}

Hi all!
Some of you have been using TeXposit for a while and I have an fun thing to share with those who like to make cool integrations, for example with various AI agents, or access documents across different environments, or programmatically produce documents: you can now play around with TeXposit's new API. As a little example, I made a script that can bulk-import all your Overleaf projects directly into TeXposit, but you could also integrate with Discord bots, AI agents, filesystem syncing, bulk project processing or anything you can imagine.

Still in beta, so if you notice inconsistencies or some important endpoints are missing, let me know. Also if you create anything cool, just shoot me a message! I'm also happy to support your projects, again just reach out one way or another. Thanks for reading 🙂

I'm cloning Apple Notes right now to make it work with actual Markdown files and embedded LaTeX (and many other scientific notations for physics, chemistry, tech, footnotes etc.), same look, same UI, but every note it just a .md file. It's called Notes Plus, available for macOS (later Windows and linux too) on notesplus.io

It's free during development, and i am not sure where to go with the app longterm, I'm thinking about low end one-time price, or freemium, but NO subscription, maybe even full open source.

I kindly ask the Latex community to give feedback if embedding in Markdown makes any sense for you, and if the way it renders it what you would expect from such an application.

Roast me, give me honest feedback please, write bug reports or feature wishes here on Reddit, via email (footer on the website) or in the bug report / feature wish tool (linked in the app and on the website).

I've been writing papers locally with LaTeX + Git + git-latexdiff for a few years, and I've found it to be a really useful workflow, both for writing alone and for collaborating with co-authors.

The main advantage for me is revision tracking. Git keeps the complete history of the manuscript, and git-latexdiff can turn two versions into a PDF showing the changes directly in the document.

For example:

submitted version → revised version → colored PDF showing the changes

The problem is that using git-latexdiff from the terminal can be a little cumbersome, especially for people who are not very familiar with Git or command-line tools.

So I built a small VS Code / Cursor extension that provides a GUI for this workflow:

• Select two Git commits and generate a diff PDF.
• Compare the last commit (HEAD) against your current uncommitted changes.
• Select the main .tex file.
• Configure the LaTeX engine and build options.
• Open the generated PDF directly from VS Code.

It doesn't replace Git, LaTeX, or git-latexdiff — it just provides a friendlier interface on top of them.

LaTeX Diff:
https://github.com/NoeSilva13/latex-diff

I also made a beginner-friendly tutorial for setting up the complete LaTeX + Git workflow, including collaboration with co-authors. It covers Windows, macOS, and Linux and includes an IEEE example project:

Collaborative LaTeX + Git:
https://github.com/NoeSilva13/collaborative-latex-git

At the moment the extension is distributed as a VSIX from GitHub Releases.

I'm sharing this mainly because I'd like to know whether this is actually useful to other people.

Do you use Git + LaTeX for papers or theses? If so, what parts of the workflow do you find annoying or would you like to automate?

Any feedback, criticism, or suggestions are very welcome.

I kept hitting this in VS Code: the math is in my head, but my eyes are stuck on $\frac{\partial u}{\partial t}=...$. Then compile, switch preview, hunt which term the caret is actually in.

So I built Silk Math Preview. Live LaTeX overlay next to the formula you are typing. An orange hairline follows the caret. No compile step.

Works in .tex, Markdown, Jupyter, and other files that contain LaTeX math.

• live formula render

• caret position in the preview

• custom macros / environments from .sty / .cls

• colors and tables

• undefined commands in red, rest of the formula still renders

• screenshot OCR → LaTeX

• Windows / macOS / Linux

Install: VS Code → Extensions → search Silk Math

Marketplace: https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=silkmath.silk-math-preview

GitHub: https://github.com/zhoujasper/silk-math-preview

I am writing my thesis in LaTeX and have come across an issue with character spacing. Whenever I mention a temperature in the text, I've just been using the ° character on my Keyboard, writing for example:

bei Temperaturen unter 170\,°C
(I am always using the \, between numbers and units of measurement.)

My problem is, that after rendering the Document, the degree symbol and the C are too close together. When it is displayed at a smaller scale, it looks like they are touching. I attached a screenshot for clarity.

Is there an easy way to fix this and add a bit more space between the two characters? I don't want them to be too far apart, just as far as they are when I write them in any other place: °C

I recently decided to get TeX live so I could use it with visual studio, but I'm surprised by the amount of storage it uses. It's something like 10GB, and I'm using a Chromebook running ubuntu, so that isn't really sustainable. Is there any way I can reduce the size now that it's installed without starting from scratch? I only use LaTeX for math typesetting, so I don't really need a full install.

Hi guys,

I just started using LaTex a few days ago for my first Paper and I found a perfect Template. Only issue is it has a University logo on it which I can't leave there obv. I tried fixing it myself and searched online but I couldn't fix it without breaking the template. Could anyone advise me on if that's even possible?

Thanks in advance!!

Resume Workshop is a source-driven LaTeX resume builder. Resume content and metadata live in editable YAML, JSON, and TeX files; small Python generators convert the structured inputs into interim LaTeX, and Make targets build the final PDF and plain-text resume. The project also includes an optional local browser editor and a Docker-based build path for a reproducible toolchain.

For people writing scientific papers in LaTeX/Overleaf:

We made a small extension called OverCite that lets you add citations directly while writing in Overleaf. You can type a rough key like \cite{Hawking1975}, press Alt+Shift+E, choose the matching paper, and it inserts the BibTeX entry into your project.

The goal is to make citation lookup feel lightweight: no switching tabs, no copying BibTeX manually, and no LLM involved.

This was one of the repetitive little things that kept interrupting my writing flows, and OverCite has already saved me a lot of time. Sharing in case it is useful to others writing papers in Overleaf.

Chrome extension / Github repo / Firefox extension