latex-writer

LaTeX Writer

LaTeX is the standard document preparation system for mathematics, physics, engineering, computer science, and increasingly used across all academic disciplines for its precise typesetting, equation rendering, and bibliography management.

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Document Class Selection

Choose the document class before anything else — it sets the fundamental layout.

Class	Use Case	Key Features
article	Journal papers, short reports, conference papers	Standard academic default; no chapter divisions
report	Long reports, theses, technical documentation	Has chapters; two-sided by default
book	Textbooks, monographs, book-length works	Parts, chapters; front/main/back matter
beamer	Presentations and slides	Frame-based; themes and colour schemes
IEEEtran	IEEE journal and conference papers	Strict IEEE formatting; two-column option
revtex4-2	APS/AIP physics journals (Physical Review, etc.)	Physics-community standard; multiple journal modes
elsarticle	Elsevier journal submissions	Author-year and numbered citation modes
acmart	ACM conference and journal papers	Multiple sub-formats (acmsmall, sigconf, etc.)
memoir	Highly customisable books and theses	Replaces many packages; built-in flexibility

Standard article declaration:

\documentclass[12pt, a4paper]{article}

Two-column IEEE:

\documentclass[conference]{IEEEtran}

Elsevier submission:

\documentclass[review, 12pt]{elsarticle}

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Minimal Working Example (MWE)

Every LaTeX document needs this skeleton:

\documentclass[12pt, a4paper]{article}

% ── Encoding & fonts ──────────────────────────────────────────
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}   % not needed in modern TeX distributions

% ── Page geometry ─────────────────────────────────────────────
\usepackage[margin=2.5cm]{geometry}

% ── Mathematics ───────────────────────────────────────────────
\usepackage{amsmath, amssymb, amsthm}

% ── Bibliography ──────────────────────────────────────────────
\usepackage[style=apa, backend=biber]{biblatex}
\addbibresource{references.bib}

% ── Figures ───────────────────────────────────────────────────
\usepackage{graphicx}
\graphicspath{{figures/}}

% ── Tables ────────────────────────────────────────────────────
\usepackage{booktabs}

% ── Cross-references ──────────────────────────────────────────
\usepackage[hidelinks]{hyperref}
\usepackage{cleveref}

% ── Title information ─────────────────────────────────────────
\title{Your Paper Title}
\author{Author Name \and Second Author}
\date{\today}

\begin{document}
\maketitle
\begin{abstract}
  Your abstract text.
\end{abstract}

\section{Introduction}
Your introduction.

\printbibliography
\end{document}