5 ms·

I thought the default style(s) were the results of years of micro tweaking and deep studies of the impact of character positioning and flows by Knuth and that o

I thought the default style(s) were the results of years of micro tweaking and deep studies of the impact of character positioning and flows by Knuth and that only the default \LaTeX{} style could give that 2% head start or that A instead of a B++ for any essay. Now we add blue titles ? And sans serif font ? Sarcasm apart, it looks good. Some links are 404 on the page though (classic thesis, etc.).

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
Maakuth 11y ago
Indeed, blue titles evoke MS Word. As pointed out, a PDF rendered with this style would be great help in understanding it. Perhaps it's a good choice for on-screen reading, but shouldn't you go with serif typefaces when laying out for print?
- johnchristopher 11y ago
  A long time ago I did some googling (aka `research') on the subject and indeed I found out that using serif for printed documents is non negotiable ; it's supposed (and I agree with that) to let the eyes decrypt words faster and smoother than when reading sans serif. Oddly enough sans serif is easier to decipher on screens. I don't know yet which kind of fonts I should use on my e-reader though. The web seems to think it's a matter of taste and adequacy nowadays: http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2013/03/serif-vs-sans-the-final-battle/ http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2013/03/serif-vs-sans-the-fi... http://designshack.net/articles/typography/serif-vs-sans-serif-fonts-is-one-really-better-than-the-other/ http://designshack.net/articles/typography/serif-vs-sans-ser... http://www.fonts.com/content/learning/fontology/level-1/type-anatomy/serif-vs-sans-for-text-in-print http://www.fonts.com/content/learning/fontology/level-1/type...
  - kevin_thibedeau 11y ago
    Those studies focused on geometric sans serif fonts like Helvetica. Humanist sans fonts have been demonstrated to have higher legibility in print.
bhaak 11y ago
You seem to confuse TeX and LaTeX. Knuth himself doesn't do LaTeX so the default styles aren't from him. It's been a while since I read the documentation to KOMAscript and Memoir but I think both contain some criticism on Lamport's default styles. There is nothing wrong per se with a sans serif font for titles as long as it fits to the serif font for the main text. I'm not quite convinced though that this is the case here. BTW, the README states that this layout has been "inspired by user guide documents from Apple Inc." So don't bash on the ground it might look like a Word document. ;-)
- johnchristopher 11y ago
  > You seem to confuse TeX and LaTeX. Knuth himself doesn't do LaTeX so the default styles aren't from him. Oops, mea culpa. You're right, I mixed both thinking Latex and Tex were quite equivalent in term of style rendering. I never bothered looking into Tex, I just wrote some Latex classes (and documents, of course). > BTW, the README states that this layout has been "inspired by user guide documents from Apple Inc." So don't bash on the ground it might look like a Word document. ;-) Oh but Word wasn't on my mind at all when I commented. I even followed the link on keynote to see what was the reference (since I never looked at keynote or iLifexxx documentation).
  - TylerE 11y ago
    Basically.... TeX is low level formatting...like pre-CSS HTML... with the equivalent of <font> tags every where. LaTeX is like CSS...being a set of markup-driven global rules.
MengerSponge 11y ago
I doubt there were deep studies, because there so much of a document's design is a matter of taste. For example, Don Knuth really liked a certain generation of math journals, so he built TeX and CM to emulate that. Just because it's the default doesn't mean it's an optimal design. I'm partial to serif fonts, and Scala in particular, but Apple's design documents are beautiful too, and I can't begrudge someone wanting to emulate their design.
hiphopyo 11y ago
+1. The blue titles, the unnecessary lines and the fact that he branded it with the whole Clean<bold>Thesis</bold> thing doesn't really sound clean in my book. I'm currently looking for a thesis template as well, but the more I come across (1) the more I just want to do something like http://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ http://motherfuckingwebsite.com/. (1) http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/326/latex-templates-for-writing-a-thesis http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/326/latex-templates-f...
- paulojreis 11y ago
  This link got me started in TeX (I was just barely aware of its existence before). http://nitens.org/taraborelli/cvtex http://nitens.org/taraborelli/cvtex Not a thesis template at all, but great ideas and it sheds some light on how to get decent typography. On a side note, I think it would be great to have a good WYSIWYG TeX editor for office/basic user level of proficiency. Typesetting does matter, it profoundly impacts reading, which is particularly relevant when you're giving 300+ pages of your hard work for someone else to read. It would be very good for everyone to get decent default typesetting. Unfortunately, our alternatives are: * Word/typical word processors, which are are horrible at typesetting; * TeX, which is good, but it's hard for most people and has an aura of complexity (it's code, after all...); * Publishing software, such as Adobe InDesign, which are indeed great at typesetting, but only if you know what you are doing. This is professional software, which is clearly not aimed at common users.
  - JupiterMoon 11y ago
    Check out Lyx
    - jhasse 11y ago
      +1 I've wrote my Bachelor thesis in LyX and it's awesome, especially for math! If someone is interested (it's about Bitcoin and in German), here's the source: http://www.math.uni-bremen.de/~jhasse/Bachelor-Arbeit.zip http://www.math.uni-bremen.de/~jhasse/Bachelor-Arbeit.zip And here's the PDF: http://www.math.uni-bremen.de/~jhasse/Kryptografische%20Grundlagen%20von%20Bitcoin.pdf http://www.math.uni-bremen.de/~jhasse/Kryptografische%20Grun... Nothing fancy like Clean Thesis though. I like the http://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ http://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ approach better ;)
baby 11y ago
Yeah I don't understand this sans serif font either.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

Maakuth 11y ago

Indeed, blue titles evoke MS Word. As pointed out, a PDF rendered with this style would be great help in understanding it. Perhaps it's a good choice for on-screen reading, but shouldn't you go with serif typefaces when laying out for print?

johnchristopher 11y ago
A long time ago I did some googling (aka `research') on the subject and indeed I found out that using serif for printed documents is non negotiable ; it's supposed (and I agree with that) to let the eyes decrypt words faster and smoother than when reading sans serif. Oddly enough sans serif is easier to decipher on screens. I don't know yet which kind of fonts I should use on my e-reader though. The web seems to think it's a matter of taste and adequacy nowadays: http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2013/03/serif-vs-sans-the-final-battle/ http://www.webdesignerdepot.com/2013/03/serif-vs-sans-the-fi... http://designshack.net/articles/typography/serif-vs-sans-serif-fonts-is-one-really-better-than-the-other/ http://designshack.net/articles/typography/serif-vs-sans-ser... http://www.fonts.com/content/learning/fontology/level-1/type-anatomy/serif-vs-sans-for-text-in-print http://www.fonts.com/content/learning/fontology/level-1/type...
- kevin_thibedeau 11y ago
  Those studies focused on geometric sans serif fonts like Helvetica. Humanist sans fonts have been demonstrated to have higher legibility in print.

bhaak 11y ago

You seem to confuse TeX and LaTeX. Knuth himself doesn't do LaTeX so the default styles aren't from him. It's been a while since I read the documentation to KOMAscript and Memoir but I think both contain some criticism on Lamport's default styles. There is nothing wrong per se with a sans serif font for titles as long as it fits to the serif font for the main text. I'm not quite convinced though that this is the case here. BTW, the README states that this layout has been "inspired by user guide documents from Apple Inc." So don't bash on the ground it might look like a Word document. ;-)

johnchristopher 11y ago
> You seem to confuse TeX and LaTeX. Knuth himself doesn't do LaTeX so the default styles aren't from him. Oops, mea culpa. You're right, I mixed both thinking Latex and Tex were quite equivalent in term of style rendering. I never bothered looking into Tex, I just wrote some Latex classes (and documents, of course). > BTW, the README states that this layout has been "inspired by user guide documents from Apple Inc." So don't bash on the ground it might look like a Word document. ;-) Oh but Word wasn't on my mind at all when I commented. I even followed the link on keynote to see what was the reference (since I never looked at keynote or iLifexxx documentation).
- TylerE 11y ago
  Basically.... TeX is low level formatting...like pre-CSS HTML... with the equivalent of <font> tags every where. LaTeX is like CSS...being a set of markup-driven global rules.

MengerSponge 11y ago

I doubt there were deep studies, because there so much of a document's design is a matter of taste. For example, Don Knuth really liked a certain generation of math journals, so he built TeX and CM to emulate that. Just because it's the default doesn't mean it's an optimal design. I'm partial to serif fonts, and Scala in particular, but Apple's design documents are beautiful too, and I can't begrudge someone wanting to emulate their design.

hiphopyo 11y ago

+1. The blue titles, the unnecessary lines and the fact that he branded it with the whole Clean<bold>Thesis</bold> thing doesn't really sound clean in my book. I'm currently looking for a thesis template as well, but the more I come across (1) the more I just want to do something like http://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ http://motherfuckingwebsite.com/. (1) http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/326/latex-templates-for-writing-a-thesis http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/326/latex-templates-f...

paulojreis 11y ago
This link got me started in TeX (I was just barely aware of its existence before). http://nitens.org/taraborelli/cvtex http://nitens.org/taraborelli/cvtex Not a thesis template at all, but great ideas and it sheds some light on how to get decent typography. On a side note, I think it would be great to have a good WYSIWYG TeX editor for office/basic user level of proficiency. Typesetting does matter, it profoundly impacts reading, which is particularly relevant when you're giving 300+ pages of your hard work for someone else to read. It would be very good for everyone to get decent default typesetting. Unfortunately, our alternatives are: * Word/typical word processors, which are are horrible at typesetting; * TeX, which is good, but it's hard for most people and has an aura of complexity (it's code, after all...); * Publishing software, such as Adobe InDesign, which are indeed great at typesetting, but only if you know what you are doing. This is professional software, which is clearly not aimed at common users.
- JupiterMoon 11y ago
  Check out Lyx
  - jhasse 11y ago
    +1 I've wrote my Bachelor thesis in LyX and it's awesome, especially for math! If someone is interested (it's about Bitcoin and in German), here's the source: http://www.math.uni-bremen.de/~jhasse/Bachelor-Arbeit.zip http://www.math.uni-bremen.de/~jhasse/Bachelor-Arbeit.zip And here's the PDF: http://www.math.uni-bremen.de/~jhasse/Kryptografische%20Grundlagen%20von%20Bitcoin.pdf http://www.math.uni-bremen.de/~jhasse/Kryptografische%20Grun... Nothing fancy like Clean Thesis though. I like the http://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ http://motherfuckingwebsite.com/ approach better ;)

baby 11y ago

Yeah I don't understand this sans serif font either.