July 2011 mailing – Scientific Word Ltd.

Two columns: Several weeks ago now, someone from Turkey contacted us via our page at http://www.scientific-workplace.com/ , asking:

"Hi, how can I create double columns conference paper at Scientific workplace without knowing latex code, is there any easy way?"

We're a little surprised we've never covered this before. We replied:

Thanks for your message. The easiest way is to start with a shell document with the typesetting specifications you want, such as Balkema (File - New - Articles - Balkema); when you click on Typeset - PreviewPDF you'll see your document is typeset in two columns. If you have already written your document you can import the contents into a Balkema shell by clicking on File - Import Contents from the Balkema document. Actually, many documents can be converted to two columns by using the class options: Typeset - Options & Packages - Class Options - Modify - Columns - two columns - OK. And the Standard LaTeX Conference Proceedings document (File - New - Standard LaTeX - Standard LaTeX Conference Proceedings) is already in two columns.
Hope this is helpful. Further technical support is available from the distributor who sold the software to you, on production of your serial number.
If you wish to consider the possibility of buying our expert Consultancy time, please go to https://www.sciword.co.uk/consult.htm for further details.

The Consultancy page provides a way for those who did not buy their Scientific Word/WorkPlace/Notebook software from us to benefit from our expert Technical Support - though obviously not free of charge as it is for our own users.

Accents package: The accents package allows the creation of accents from virtually any symbol (see Help - Search - accents - accents package - package documentation). However, unless you already have the amsmath package loaded in the document before the accents package, it doesn't work. But now you know, it's a feature you might well want to use...

Numbered lists not behaving: A university professor who's been using our software since the 1990s was getting frustrated with Numbered lists, and Emailed us after having made many valiant attempts around the right basic idea (see list.tex):

"I've been trying to start a numbered list at number 24 rather than 1. So I
add the tex field \setcounter{enumi}{24}.
First attempt: I start a numbered list with F7, and I then add this text at the
beginning. Result: the first item is number 1, and the second is number 25.
Second attempt: I open the .tex file in Notepad, and move the tex field to
between the \begin{enumerate} and the first \item. Result: SWP doesn't like
anything between those, and so it adds an extra \item before my tex field, so
now I have an empty item 1.
Third attempt: I read about a package enumitem, so I added this to the
contributed folder. Result: SWP didn't offer this as a package and every
way I tried to add it manually in the preamble caused mayhem.
Fourth attempt: Go back to the second attempt, accept SWP's insistence
on having \item immediately after \begin{enumerate}, but tell it to have a
blank item number. Then something innocuous to fill the empty item space.
That at least allows me to finish my document without it looking totally
wrong, but it's not a happy solution. Any better ideas?"

We gave him a couple of solutions in our response, as well as information about adding new entries into the list of packages available to your documents without "Going Native" (in the text below, just replace c:\swp55 with c:\sw55 for Scientific Word):

Thanks for your Email. I'm sorry you've had problems adding an external package to your document: assuming you've got the .sty file saved where Scientific WorkPlace will look (any subfolder of c:\swp55\TCITeX\TeX\LaTeX\ ) you can add it to your document by clicking on Typeset - Options & Packages - Package Options - Go Native, and then inserting the package name in the field below inside curly brackets. Or to have your new package appear in the list of packages available at Typeset - Options & Packages - Package Options - Add for that class of document (eg. article class), use WordPad or NotePad to open c:\swp55\Typeset\classes.pkg, find the line [article] (or whatever the class of document for which you want to modify the package list) and add your new package name underneath. Scientific WorkPlace presents that list of packages in alphabetical order when you look to add a new package to a document of that class.
However, you didn't need to do this (and I'm not sure enumitem would achieve your purpose anyway). Here are two solutions:

The easy fix (see list2.tex attached): From your first attempt, simply number your first list item manually by right-clicking on the item lead-in, selecting Properties, changing to Custom, and entering "24.". This will match the second item (the first automated one) which will be "25.".

The better way (see list3.tex attached): Add the newpnts package, move your TeX field before the list, and add the command "\RESUME" either after \setcounter{enumi}{23} or in a separate TeX field. This is documented at Help - Search - lists - lists - creating a numbered list that doesn't begin at 1.

Obviously you'll need to Typeset - PreviewPDF the .tex files to see the results. You may also wish to see Item 3 from our February 2010 mailing, which also deals with Numbered lists..

Files won't open: This is more of a Windows problem: some users from Israel contacted us when they found that clicking on .tex files in Windows Explorer was not causing Scientific Word/WorkPlace to open. We found there was nothing wrong with the sample .tex file they sent, and wrote back with instructions for correcting the association of the .tex file extension with Scientific Word/WorkPlace:

It sounds like you have not got the .tex extension correctly associated with Scientific WorkPlace v5.5. We suggest you:

Open Windows Explorer (Start - Programs - Accessories - Windows Explorer) and go to c:\swp55\docs

Right click on one of the .tex files, and choose Open With.

If Scientific WorkPlace is showing, choose that

If not, choose Choose Default Program. Click on Browse, and navigate to c:\swp55\swp-pro.exe as the application to open .tex files

Be sure to tick the box marked "Always use the selected program to open this kind of file".

Calibri font: Here's another interesting question, which was an issue for a UK academic:

"I have submitted a paper to a journal and they require one part of it to be in pdf format with the requirements:
We need the text used to be Calibri, size 9 (or
something similar) and the page numbers to be removed.
Its not clear to me how to change the font to Calirbi.
(I use the nopageno package to remove the page numbers)."

Our software cannot yet use Calibri, and so we replied with the following workaround:

...but Arial is very similar to Calibri, and we cover that in our previous circular mailings, available to our users at https://www.sciword.co.uk/mailings/ - see April 2009 (Item 1) and December 2010 (Item 3), which directs you to our online Help - Search - sans - sans serif fonts - PSNFSS packages page. The short answer is that the helvet package converts your Sans Serif text into Arial in the absence of the Helvetica PostScript font.
And we covered font sizes in our May 2011 mailing (Item 2). Hope this helps...

...and we also hope it will be of wider usefulness to other users.

Bibliography styles: From our page at http://www.scientific-word.com/ , someone wrote:

"I have troubles creating reference at the end of the paper without listing numbers, to be specific, in a apa style. Could you help me?"

Here's what he needed to know:

Please see the attached document, created using Scientific Word and typeset-printed directly to PDF; the apa style requires the astron package. To discover this you would need to read the original BibTeXBibliographyStyles document, available from our December 2010 circular mailing to our users: https://www.sciword.co.uk/mailings/December2010.htm Item 2:
apa
The style has been adapted from alpha. It supports a short citation form and requires the astron package.

Please remember that to generate the bibliography from the attached document you'll need to click on Typeset - CompilePDF - Generate a Bibliography, before then clicking on Typeset - PreviewPDF to see the bibliography typeset according to the apa bibliography style. You may also want to read the online Help - Search - astron - astron package - astron package (though we agree: this would not help if you didn't already know it was the astron package you needed).

Graphics - no: Amazingly, there have been no technical support issues raising significant new issues about graphics. We thought you'd like to know...