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Is there any common way to mention that a document has been typeset by TeX? So non-TeXnicians (TeXperts) may become a little familiar with the TeX world.

Update: It would be nice if one hero make a package that inserts such information in beauty and concise manner in a given language, so even lazy TeXnicians will credit TeX. For example:

...
\usepackage{colophon}
...
\colophon[language=fa,packages=bibtex,xepersian]
...
Real Dreams
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5 Answers5

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TeXies have a good chance of recognizing TeXed documents, especially if Computer Modern (or Latin Modern) is used. But assuming you want to convert Word-users and other heathens, figuratively speaking, you could use a colophon, a "brief description of publication or production notes relevant to the edition, in modern books usually located at the reverse of the title page, but can also sometimes be located at the end of the book" (Wikipedia). Some of the theses listed at Showcase of beautiful typography done in TeX & friends have such notes:

This thesis was typeset using the LaTeX typesetting system originally developed by Leslie Lamport, based on TeX created by Donald Knuth.

(Eivind Uggedal)

Typeset by the author in Fedra Serif B using LaTeX. Cover design by Sam Ross-Gower.

(Michael Ummels)

And here's a particularly pretty one:

Colophon. This document was created using LaTeX2ε and BibTeX and edited in the Mac-Vim environment with the LaTeX-vim plug-in. The typesettings software used the XeTeX distribution and the fontspec package. The text is set in Hoefler Text and Candara. The source code is set in Consolas. The animal depicted on the cover is a common eland (taurotragus oryx). The original photograph was taken from flickr.com/photos/paulmullett/505797443/ and is used and modified with permission under the Creative Commons “by-nc” license. The author of the original picture is Paul Mullett.

(Konrad Rudolph)

Here's another cool one from The Book of Tea by Okakura Kazuko as typeset by William Adams. Part of this book can be found as an example of TeX typography in the TeX showcase.

Colophon. Typeset in Octavian, by David Kindersley. by Dr. Donald Knuth’s TeX system. Printed on Crane’s Crest paper. with a NeXT Laserprinter. by an ’040 NeXT Cube. Converted to .pdf. by pStill.app.

If you actually want to get people started by your notes (and not just potentially curious), I'd point them to Tobias Oetiker's The Not So Short Introduction to LaTeX2ε, and – obviously – to tex.sx.

doncherry
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    Beat me by a few seconds, nice answer :) – ienissei Jul 16 '12 at 12:16
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    I wish this were still common. I've read several books recently where I wish I knew what typeface they were using! I know I could take a picture and upload it to this or that site, but just having the info in the book would be great. – Seamus Jul 16 '12 at 14:00
  • Regarding that bachelors thesis: it is really nice looking. But better use the ccions package. – bodo Jul 16 '12 at 14:05
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    What's the ccions package, what is it good for, and why is it not coming up on google? – alexis Jul 16 '12 at 15:37
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    oh, I meant ccicons. This is not directly related to the original question. Just noticed the ugly creative commons symbols there. – bodo Jul 16 '12 at 16:21
  • how can i have the font used in the colophon for "fontspec" ? thanks – Aurelius Jul 16 '12 at 17:19
  • @FormlessCloud: I'd suggest asking Konrad Rudolph that question at the post in which he presented his thesis: http://tex.stackexchange.com/a/1474/4012. If the solution turns out to be interesting, make it a new question! (I'd assume that it's just some font used with XeLaTeX and accessing stylistic variants, though.) – doncherry Jul 16 '12 at 17:31
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Here's an angle: Don't do anything. Instead, have a look at the PDF information (in case of PDF output), in this example, Preview.app's cmd+i -window (sorry for the localization, but I hope you get the idea):

enter image description here

Et voilà, unobtrusive and simple.

morbusg
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First of all: it seems a good idea to mention somewhere "Document typeset with LaTeX". Because your readers may realise that this is a well typeset document, but may have no clue how it has been produced.

Where you mention your machinery surely depends on your document. In a book the acknowledgements are the place to mention LaTeX or whatever. I a report maybe on the last page or the last footnote in smaller print? This seems a question of taste.

Keks Dose
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    It is not really LaTeX that typesets it; it is your TeX engine that typesets it. LaTeX is just a bunch of macros like any other package. – Abu-Lu'lu'ah al-Nahawandi Jul 16 '12 at 11:56
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    @Abu-Lu'lu'ahal-Nahawandi I disagree, your honor: If you were informed "typeset by TeX", you'd have to figure out by yourself whether it was LaTeX or ConTeX or whatever. But it's LaTeX which consists of a kernel, thousands of packages and a lively community. "LaTeX" is the helpfull piece of information to people who never have heard of anything but Wörd. – Keks Dose Jul 16 '12 at 13:12
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    Neither LaTeX nor ConTeXt by themselves can typeset anything for you; it is the underlying TeX engine that typeset it. – Abu-Lu'lu'ah al-Nahawandi Jul 16 '12 at 13:21
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    So if I use color package to typeset a document, can I claim that clor package typeset that document? the answer is no since color package can not do anything on its own. It is a macro package that tells TeX what to do and it is TeX that actually typesets your document not color package. – Abu-Lu'lu'ah al-Nahawandi Jul 16 '12 at 13:24
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    LaTeX isn't a package. It's a format. – Ian Thompson Jul 16 '12 at 13:51
  • I know that LaTeX is a format but that does not make any difference. Both LaTeX and any package are some macros. – Abu-Lu'lu'ah al-Nahawandi Jul 16 '12 at 13:55
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    @Abu-Lu'lu'ahal-Nahawandi: The difference is that all that I -- as an end-user -- use is LaTeX. I say latex thesis.tex, not tex thesis.tex. It's like saying "I got here by car" instead of "I got here by combustion of gasoline". The fine difference might be saying "This document was typeset with LaTeX" instead of "by LaTeX". – doncherry Jul 16 '12 at 14:16
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    @doncherry: LaTeX doesn't typeset anything, it's TeX that does all the work! (and, well, the output drivers, but you get the idea) – morbusg Jul 16 '12 at 14:17
  • @morbusg: But couldn't you say "This letter was typeset with the typewriter XYZ", even though eventually it was me who pushed down the keys (i.e. typeset by me, with/using a certain tool)? – doncherry Jul 16 '12 at 14:19
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    @doncherry: I don't think it's fruitful to start thinking of analogies here. It's just that, well, I think it's empathy that gets me all riled up when people say LaTeX (read: Leslie Lamport et co.) does this or that, when in fact it is TeX (read: Don Knuth) that does it. – morbusg Jul 16 '12 at 14:23
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    TeX is the real engine and does all the real work. LaTeX is a (large) framework for TeX, normally dumped to a format. True, it's by far the most popular TeX environment, and it's the name many people know it by; but it's the paint, not the car. (Sorry for using an analogy, morbusg!) Keks and @doncherry, you probably use a GUI editor, but if you say "this document was typeset with Texshop", you're missing the point. Ditto for LaTeX. By all means mention LaTeX as well (and your GUI, why not), but if you leave TeX out, you're either sloppy or confused. – alexis Jul 16 '12 at 15:59
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    It would be very hard to mention LaTeX and leave out TeX. In LaTeX: A document preparation system(section 1.3), Leslie Lamport writes "TheTeXinLaTeXrefers to Donald Knuth'sTeX` typesetting system." – Ian Thompson Jul 16 '12 at 17:31
  • Saying that LaTeX doesn't do the typesetting makes as much sense as saying that it's not the car that is driving from a to b but the engine/gas/tires/... – topskip Jul 16 '12 at 18:29
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    From the LaTeX Companion ("Production Notes"): "This book was typeset using the LaTeX document processing system.... The book was typset with the base LaTeX release dated 2003/12/01. The pdfTeX program was used as the underlying engine, but it was not set to produce PDF output [because they wanted 'hanging punctuation' from the pdfcprot package]." Also: I don't think many people use the TeX engine anymore; isn't it almost always pdfTeX, LuaTeX, or XeTeX? – jon Jul 16 '12 at 19:37
  • @Abu-Lu'lu'ahal-Nahawandi -- I thought colour was a feature of the driver (e.g., dvips), not (plain) TeX. Isn't that why plain TeX users are supposed to load miniltx.tex in order to use the color package..? – jon Jul 16 '12 at 20:27
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  1. Make the document as easy on the eye as possible. This'll make people wonder what package you've used to produce it.

  2. At the end of the document put a small - very brief - note in the bottom right corner :

       [LaTeX typeset]
    
Deek
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    Plainly that's for the other posters to judge not you or me. But I'd have thought that my reply was easier to absorb. – Deek Jul 16 '12 at 13:53
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\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage[colorlinks]{hyperref}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\AtEndDocument{%
\begin{flushright}
    \sf\small This document was typeset by \href{http://tex.stackexchange.com}{\TeX}.
\end{flushright}}

\begin{document}
\lipsum
\end{document}
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    It is not really LaTeX that typesets it; it is your TeX engine that typesets it. LaTeX is just a bunch of macros like any other package. – Abu-Lu'lu'ah al-Nahawandi Jul 16 '12 at 11:56
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    @Abu-Lu'lu'ahal-Nahawandi I think the distinction between LaTeX and TeX is ridiculous. For a beginner, it is doing more harm than good (they start looking for TeX books such as the TeXbook) and for experts, well, they know the difference. – topskip Jul 16 '12 at 16:25
  • @Abu-Lu'lu'ahal-Nahawandi What about this document was created with LaTeX? I was already using LaTeX for a while when I noticed that people tend to use the word 'typesetting' here, and some more time until I started to have a faint idea about what it means. For an ordinary person there is no distinction IMO. This way we could stop this ridiculous discussion about TeX vs. LaTeX etc.. (Do I need the two periods here by the way? :-) ) – marczellm Jul 02 '13 at 20:20
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    @marczellm No, you don't. See http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/8382/when-etc-is-at-the-end-of-a-phrase-do-you-place-a-period-after-it . – John Wickerson Jul 16 '13 at 12:07
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    how about: This document was typeset using the LaTeX document processing system originally developed by Leslie Lamport, based on TeX typesetting system created by Donald Knuth. Inspired by doncherry nice answer. – A.GH Aug 26 '14 at 14:30
  • I find it problematic to link to this site when mentioning TeX. This site didn't invent TeX itself, it should be linked separately with some explanation. – lblb Apr 02 '17 at 17:16