Writing your thesis (or transfer report) in LaTeX

For those who would like to write their Ph.D. thesis in LaTeX, I have provided some files that will help you produce something that is generally acceptable within the School, available as eim_style.tgz (also a Lyx version).

The style defined here is a suggestion only; there are very few rules about the thesis format. However something similar worked for several people (including me). You could also adapt it for your transfer report if you like. The important files are:

I have tried to put as much as possible into the style file . However I am not an experienced TeX writer, and so a certain amount of setting-up stuff ended up in the top-level .tex file. The result does actually compile; if using pdflatex it will produce a pdf file.

There are some options that you can set in the thesis.tex file, including:

• If you wish to print it single-sided, reverse the commenting of the two \documentclass lines at the top of the file. This is strongly discouraged in CVSSP, and you may be asked to pay for the paper yourself.
• If you prefer a coloured crest, uncomment the line beginning %\newlogo
• You can change the level of section numbering and table-of-contents depth by changing the values shown.

Some things that I didn't include, but you may want to consider:

• a list of symbols, if you have included a lot of maths
• a glossary, if you have a lot of acronyms or other specialised words or phrases
• a list of your own publications

Some things that everyone seems to include, but are actually fairly useless:

• list of figures
• list of tables

There is also a School page, which contains similar information.

Please also refer to the UOS guidelines.

Frequent mistake: Nearly all the reports / theses that I read get confused about Latex double quotes ("). Opening quotes should be made of 2 single opening quotes (``) and similarly for closing ones (''). Much more professional that way.

Don't forget: give your supervisor(s) a copy of your thesis / report in plenty of time so that they have time to give you some feedback.

Any suggestions for improvements to the template are welcome.