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<H1><A NAME="SECTION000500000000000000000"></A><A NAME="latex-primer"></A>
<BR>
4 <span class="LaTeX">LaTeX</span> Primer
</H1>

<P>
This section is a brief introduction to <span class="LaTeX">LaTeX</span> concepts and
  syntax, to provide authors enough information to author documents
  productively without having to become ``<span class="TeX">TeX</span>nicians.''  This does
  not teach everything needed to know about writing <span class="LaTeX">LaTeX</span> for
  Python documentation; many of the standard ``environments'' are not
  described here (though you will learn how to mark something as an
  environment).

<P>
Perhaps the most important concept to keep in mind while marking up
  Python documentation is that while <span class="TeX">TeX</span> is unstructured, <span class="LaTeX">LaTeX</span> was
  designed as a layer on top of <span class="TeX">TeX</span> which specifically supports
  structured markup.  The Python-specific markup is intended to extend
  the structure provided by standard <span class="LaTeX">LaTeX</span> document classes to
  support additional information specific to Python.

<P>
<span class="LaTeX">LaTeX</span> documents contain two parts: the preamble and the body.
  The preamble is used to specify certain metadata about the document
  itself, such as the title, the list of authors, the date, and the
  <em>class</em> the document belongs to.  Additional information used
  to control index generation and the use of bibliographic databases
  can also be placed in the preamble.  For most authors, the preamble
  can be most easily created by copying it from an existing document
  and modifying a few key pieces of information.

<P>
The <i class="dfn">class</i> of a document is used to place a document within a
  broad category of documents and set some fundamental formatting
  properties.  For Python documentation, two classes are used: the
  <code>manual</code> class and the <code>howto</code> class.  These classes also
  define the additional markup used to document Python concepts and
  structures.  Specific information about these classes is provided in
  section <A href="classes.html#classes">5</A>, ``Document Classes,'' below.  The first thing
  in the preamble is the declaration of the document's class.

<P>
After the class declaration, a number of <em>macros</em> are used to
  provide further information about the document and setup any
  additional markup that is needed.  No output is generated from the
  preamble; it is an error to include free text in the preamble
  because it would cause output.

<P>
The document body follows the preamble.  This contains all the
  printed components of the document marked up structurally.  Generic
  <span class="LaTeX">LaTeX</span> structures include hierarchical sections, numbered and
  bulleted lists, and special structures for the document abstract and
  indexes.

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<LI><A href="latex-syntax.html">4.1 Syntax</a>
<LI><A href="latex-structure.html">4.2 Hierarchical Structure</a>
<LI><A href="latex-environments.html">4.3 Common Environments</a>
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<span class="release-info">Release 2.4.2, documentation updated on 28 September 2005.</span>
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