Earlier today, I went to a local copy shop and had my diploma thesis printed. This afternoon, I will hand it in. The title is
Loop subgroups of Fr and the images of their stabilizer subgroups in GLr( ) and discusses a group-theoretical result. I assume that very few readers care about the content of the thesis, but maybe some are interested in a few assorted LaTeX hints. I m also publishing the
full TeX source code, maybe someone can make use of it.
Less chatty varioref
I m using the
varioref package, in conjunction with the
cleveref package. This provides a command
\vref fig:S3S4l which will expand to, for example, to Figure 1 on page 11 . But if the referenced figure is actually on the current page, the next page, the previous page or the facing page (in two-side layouts), it will say so: Figure 1 on this page.
This is very nice, but I assume that the reader of my thesis is able to find Figure 1 when it is visible, i.e. on the current or facing page. One can remove the referencing texts with the commands
\def\reftextfaceafter ,
\def\reftextfacebefore and
\def\reftextcurrent . But because
varioref puts a space between Figure 1 and this text, we will get a superfluous space even before punctuation.
The remedy is the command
\unskip, which removes this space again. So I use in my preamble:
\def\reftextfaceafter \unskip %
\def\reftextfacebefore \unskip %
\def\reftextcurrent \unskip %
Palatino and extra leading
I chose the Palatino font for my thesis, using the
mathpazo package. Various sources (such as the
KOMA-Script manual) suggest to use 5% extra leading:
\linespread 1.05
Counting figures independently from chapters
I don t have too many figures and tables in my thesis, and I want them to be numbered simple 1, 2, ... By default, LaTeX would say 1.1, 1.2, 2.1, ... This can be fixed using the
remreset package and these commands:
\makeatletter
\@removefromreset figure chapter
\renewcommand \thefigure \arabic figure
\@removefromreset table chapter
\renewcommand \thetable \arabic table
\makeatother
No widows and club lines
LaTeX already avoids these, but I wanted to get rid of them completely. This can be done with:
% Disable single lines at the start of a paragraph (Schusterjungen)
\clubpenalty = 10000
% Disable single lines at the end of a paragraph (Hurenkinder)
\widowpenalty = 10000 \displaywidowpenalty = 1000
Struck table lines
I had to typeset tables with some lines struck, and I could not find a ready command for that. I used the following definition, based on the code for
\hline. Note that it probably does not adjust well to other font sizes and needs to be adjusted manually:
\makeatletter
\def\stline %
\noalign \vskip-.7em\vskip-\arrayrulewidth\hrule \@height \arrayrulewidth\vskip.7em
\makeatother
Title page in one-sided layout
According to the KOMA manual, the title page as set by LaTeX is not meant to be the cover of a publication, and therefore has to be set with the margins of a right page i.e. a larger right margin and a smaller left margin. But when printing cheaply, one often just put a transparent sheet on top of the print, so the title page
is the cover. You can convince KOMA that you are right by using
\KOMAoptions twoside=false
\begin titlepage
...
\end titlepage
\KOMAoptions twoside=true
Not flushing the page for chapter heads
LaTeX would put the list of algorithms on a new right page. I found this a waste of paper for my few algorithms, and preferred to put the list right after the table of contents. You can override the LaTeX behavior using:
\tableofcontents
\let\cleardoublepage\relax % book
\let\clearpage\relax % report
\let\chapter\section
\listofalgorithms
This code also reduces the size of the heading to that of a section. The same trick also works with
\chapter.
Math in headings vs. PDF bookmarks
LaTeX with the
hyperref package creates nice PDF bookmarks from your chapter and section titles. Unfortunately, PDF bookmark names can only be plain strings, while the titles in the document might contain some math symbols. You can make both happy with
\texorpdfstring:
\section Stabilizer subgroups in \texorpdfstring $\GL_r(\Z/2\Z)$ GL\_r(Z/2Z)
Setting lines for the signature
The diploma thesis contains a small note which I have to sign, saying that I created it on my own etc. Below that, I put two labeled lines for date and signature, using the tabbing environment:
\begin tabbing
\rule 4cm .4pt \hspace 1cm \= \rule 7cm .4pt \\
Ort, Datum \> Unterschrift
\end tabbing
again a short overview about my RC bug activities:
A few weeks ago, I ve added support for Remote, Apple s iPhone application for controlling iTunes remotely. Here, support means Remote can be paired with forked-daapd and can be used to browse the library. And that s it, for now.
At this point, there won t be much visible activity on forked-daapd for some time. I m working on a couple of things, but they take time and they require a lot of new code.
So, for a couple weeks now, I ve been working on that. I have some code outside forked-daapd that is starting to work well, but it s not there yet, far from it. Then it ll have to be integrated into forked-daapd, which means a lot of new code there too.
Bug fixes will still happen in the meantime, and some smaller new features may also appear before the Big Thing . So if you find or encounter bugs, feel free to report them still. If you have patches or ideas you want to discuss, feel free too.
As I wrote to a couple people by mail already, good things come to those who wait or contribute.
With all that, I ve updated the 
Back in the 
It might be quite premature, but in 
Should universities switch away from hosting their own email and join the Google bandwagon?
I found out yesterday that 
A new release of our
(I know, I suck).
Among the main highlights of the week, I just want to cite
Welcome on board,
Mehdi! (now you're doomed: you must continue
doing that!)
):
In Ubuntu, I uploaded an rng-tools that supports the