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How To Produce A Quick Reference Guide With LaTeX

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Version 0.4
Copyright © 2007,2009 by Zack Smith.
All rights reserved.

Introduction

This is a quick overview of how I produce quick reference guides using LaTeX, which is the most popular macro package of the always-been-free TeX typesetting system.

LaTeX is a great way to produce quick reference guides for six major reasons:

  1. It is free.
  2. It has great fonts.
  3. It handles mathematical and chemical equations fairly well.
  4. It lets you create new macros (via \newcommand{}) that can greatly simplify making documents.
  5. It is not some huge bloated application like OpenOffice.
  6. It is fairly stable: A document produced today should work fine years from now.

Page format

The best page format for a quick reference guide, in my opinion, is 3 columns of 10-point text limited to just one or two pages with 0.5 inch margins. Looking at laminated quick reference sheets that are sold in bookstores this seems a common approach.

To achieve this, you can start your page with something like the following, which makes use of 3-column mode using the common "multicol" package. 

\documentclass[letterpaper,10pt]{article}
\usepackage{vmargin}
\usepackage{multicol}
\parindent=0in
\setmarg{0.5in}{0.0in}{7.5in}{9.4in}
\begin{document}
\begin{multicols*}{3}
\raggedright

Commonly required features

For my quickrefs, I've developed a set of macros that handle the sorts of features that I found are needed most:
  • Section headings using \Section{ text }
  • Subsection headings using \Subsection{ text }
  • Part headings (a level above Section) using \Part{ text }
  • Point lists using:
    • \I{ text } for the first level.
    • \II{ text } for the 2nd level.
    • \III{ text } for the third level.
    • \IIII{ text } for the fourth level.
  • Enumerated lists using \E{ text }
  • Definitions using \D{ name }{ description }
  • Point list items with definitions using:
    • \ID{ name }{description} for the first level.
    • \IID{ name }{description} for the 2nd level.
  • List heading using \List{ text}
  • Enumeration heading using \Enum{ text}
  • Encapsulated postscript images using \EPS{ text }
  • Various addition indented data such as "therefore" blocks and "example" blocks.
    • \TF{ text } = "therefore" symbol with indented text.
    • \TTF{ text } = "therefore" symbol with indented text 2nd level.
    • \Rule{ text } = "R" symbol with indented text.
    • \IMP{ text }{description} = A "implies" symbol B.
    • \EX{ text } = "EX" (meaning "example") with indented text.
    • \EEX{ text } = "EX" with indented text 2nd level.
  • Macros for common symbols e.g. degrees is \Deg.

Example output:

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