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I would like to know, if I can use LaTeX to generate report if I only have Adobe Reader or do I need Adobe Acrobat as well?

texenthusiast
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user1885650
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    You won't get anywhere here if you don't invest some time in learning something about LaTeX. If you tell us your country, maybe readers here can give you advise where to find manuals etc. in your language. Besides that: you don't need neither Adobe Reader nor Adobe Acrobat to generate PDF using LaTeX. – Keks Dose Jun 11 '13 at 15:21
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    Neither of those two applications has anything to do with LaTeX. Hence, the answer is simple, you do not need either of the applications. – nickpapior Jun 11 '13 at 15:24
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    Welcome to TeX.SX! You can have a look on our starter guide to familiarize yourself further with our format. – cmhughes Jun 11 '13 at 15:33
  • Possible Duplicate: Have a look at Answers to Best Way to Start Using LaTeX/TeX?. Follow stepwise procedure at http://www.ctan.org/starter.html. You would need Acrobat Reader to view the generated .pdf from LaTeX. – texenthusiast Jun 11 '13 at 15:35
  • Ok, but doesn't LaTeX create things in a pdf format? Don't I neccessarily need Adobe Reader to view that at the end? Tkank you for all the info. – user1885650 Jun 11 '13 at 15:38
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    The PDF format is open and there are many viewers for all operating systems. – Matthew Leingang Jun 11 '13 at 16:04
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    Why is the OP being bashed about not knowing something here? – percusse Jun 12 '13 at 07:36
  • @texenthusiast: He doesn't need any Adobe application; just a PDF viewer (of which there are many). – Martin Schröder Jun 12 '13 at 15:22
  • @percusse: "This question does not show any research effort"? – Martin Schröder Jun 12 '13 at 15:23
  • @MartinSchröder It's a well-known beginner confusion. I had the same problem for a long time. Especially if you are not into academia it's not that easy to get the basics as everything is named ....TeX. – percusse Jun 12 '13 at 16:06

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Adobe Acrobat is the full suite for creating/manipulating PDF documents. Adobe Reader is the less powerful but more convenient display version with limited document manipulation features. However Adobe Acrobat is not the only way to create PDF files. As long as the result is PDF-standard-compatible, the creator of the PDF document is not relevant.

The (La)TeX input file is a plain text file. If you compile this input file with pdflatex, you will get a PDF output. There are some PDF viewers you can use to view this PDF output. Adobe Reader is a free one and it is enough.

But if you compile the input file with latex, you will get a DVI output. In this decade, I don't think you want to have a DVI output. And if you convert the DVI output with dvips, you will get a PS output. It is also uncommon to have a PS output. To convert the PS output to PDF, use ps2pdf converter. Now you get a PDF output.

You might be confused with either using a single pdflatex or latex-dvips-ps2pdf. The rule of thumb is use pdflatex if your input file imports PDF, PNG, JPG images and has no PSTricks code. Use latex-dvips-ps2pdf if your input file import EPS images and has PSTricks code.

percusse
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kiss my armpit
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