IU-Thesis

Template repository for theses at IU, written in markdown compiled via pandoc to beautiful PDF.

• based on the Eisvogel template,
• customized to suit IU formatting guidelines
• custom cover page
• a make compile chain including pandoc-filters for all needs of academic writing:
  • citation
  • referencing tables, figures, and sections
  • table import from CSV
  • diagram generation
  • formatting
  • awesome boxes

Installation

Installing pdflatex

https://gist.github.com/rain1024/98dd5e2c6c8c28f9ea9d

sudo apt-get install texlive-latex-base texlive-fonts-recommended texlive-fonts-extra texlive-latex-extra

Installing LaTeX

Consult the Eisvogel installation instructions:

https://github.com/Wandmalfarbe/pandoc-latex-template#installation

Note: Installing MikTeX caused compile errors.

Citation Styles

Get them from here:

https://github.com/citation-style-language/styles

Cover Page Hack

The title page section has been overwritten in the Eisvogel template with a pandoc template partial to provide a custom cover that can still expand pandoc's variables. See the issue on the Eisvogel GitHub for further details:

Wandmalfarbe/pandoc-latex-template#260

Diagrams

PlantUML diagrams are exported to SVG via a custom make target and afterward included as a figure. In the future pandoc-plot might be used for that purpose. The diagram code might even be imported via pandoc-include into the code block.

Dependencies

niet

pipx install niet

plantuml

sudo apt install plantuml

pandoc-include

https://github.com/DCsunset/pandoc-include

pipx install pandoc-include

pandoc-mustache

https://github.com/michaelstepner/pandoc-mustache

pipx install pandoc-mustache

pantable

https://github.com/ickc/pantable

pipx install pantable

pandoc-latex-environment

https://github.com/chdemko/pandoc-latex-environment

pipx install pandoc-latex-environment

bibtex-tidy

https://www.npmjs.com/package/bibtex-tidy https://flamingtempura.github.io/bibtex-tidy

npm install -g bibtex-tidy

bibcure

https://github.com/bibcure/bibcure

pipx install bibcure

Visual Studio Code Plugins

• Markdown All in One (yzhang.markdown-all-in-one)
• Markdown+Math (goessner.mdmath)
• markdownlint (DavidAnson.vscode-markdownlint)
• Pandoc Citer (notZaki.pandocciter)
  • cross-ref does not work across file boundaries when using multiple md files: notZaki/PandocCiter#37
• LanguageTool for Visual Studio Code (adamvoss.vscode-languagetool)
  • English Support for LanguageTool (adamvoss.vscode-languagetool-en)
• proselint (PatrykPeszko.vscode-proselint)
  • pipx install proselint

IU Formatting Guidelines

• Paper format: DIN A4
• Page margins:
  • Top and bottom 2 cm;
  • left 2 cm; right 2 cm
• Page numbers:
  • Centered at the end of the page
  • Apart from the title page, all pages must be numbered.
  • The pages before the body of the text (if applicable, e.g. title page, table of contents, list of tables and abbreviations) should be numbered in Roman capital letters (I, II, III, IV, etc.), with the page number not appearing on page I (title page).
  • The introduction should be the first page with Arabic numbering, beginning with “1”.
    • The pages of the text part are numbered with Arabic numbers (1, 2, 3, etc.). These page numbers are continued to the end, i.e., also through the appendix (if applicable).
• Font:
  • General text - Arial 11 pt.
  • Headings - 12 pt.
  • Justified
  • Footnotes: Arial 10 point, justified
  • Paragraphs:
    • According to the conceptual structure
    • 6 pt. spacing after line breaks
• Line spacing: 1.5
• Sentence: Justified; hyphenation
• Citation standard: APA
• Title page: The title page should contain at least the following elements:
  • type of thesis (Advanced Workbook / Research Essay / etc. ...)
  • course name,
  • course of study,
  • date, author’s name,
  • matriculation number,
  • tutor’s name.
  • Course-specific adaptations of the information are possible.
  • Master thesis requires more further information to be given.
• Sections and subsections:
  • A maximum of three levels (1. Main heading, 1.1 Section, 1.1.1 Subheading)
  • Only individual chapters in the text of the assignment are numbered consecutively
  • otherwise, sections of the assignment, such as the list of figures and/or tables or the bibliography are not numbered.
• emphasis:
  • Do not underline
  • use italics sparingly to emphasize passages.
• page footer:
  • The ideal position of the page numbers is centered at the bottom.
• page header:
  • According to APA standards, the header should contain the title of the thesis or, if it is too long, an abbreviated version (American Psychological Association, 2007, p.288).

Pandoc Options

MAN pages

The man pages of pandoc are extensive: man pandoc

default latex template

It can be insightful to study how pandoc's default latex template is structured and what variables are being used.

default.latex

Notes

On prettier

This project uses prettier for formatting markdown files. Unfortunately, prettier screws up when encountering a multiline math block using double dollar signs. This annoyingly led to prettier to insert another at the end of the file.

https://github.com/executablebooks/mdformat#why-not-use-prettier-instead

Changing fonts

The Eisvogel template requires compilation via the --pdf-engine=xelatex option to override the default font.

Wandmalfarbe/pandoc-latex-template#96 (comment) https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/234786/how-to-set-a-font-family-with-pandoc https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/25249/how-do-i-use-a-particular-font-for-a-small-section-of-text-in-my-document https://tug.org/FontCatalogue/sourcecodepro/

Links

https://pandoc.org/MANUAL.html#pandocs-markdown https://learnxinyminutes.com/docs/make/ https://lierdakil.github.io/pandoc-crossref/

Contributions

If you want to improve further iu-thesis, open a pull request. Your contributions are warmly welcome. 🤗