Category Archives: General

Getting the Default LaTeX Look in Word 2007

General, Political Economy, Tech Zone, , , ,

LaTeX has a very recognizable “default” look. If you routinely read working papers, you almost certainly have come across quite a few of them. You could very well be a seasoned LaTeX user youself.

Now, for one reason or another, sometimes you just need to use Word, and getting Word output to look like LaTeX is no easy task. Why might you want to make a Word document look like LaTeX? There are many motivations–perhaps you prefer the neat styling, or perhaps you do not want readers with big LaTeX-ego to discover that you used Word.

Here’s how I do it personally.

  1. First you need the “LaTeX font”. Half of the LaTeX looks comes from the font. LaTeX uses Computer Modern by default. While there is a Word compatible port of the font, it lacks many characters that you would need in a word processor. What you need to use instead is Latin Modern, which is an expansion on the former. You can get OpenType Latin Modern fonts here. Usually it is sufficient to download only lmroman12-regular.otf, lmroman12-bold.otf and lmroman12-italic.otf. After downloading, go to [Control Panel] -> [Fonts]. You can simply drag the fonts into the window that shows up to install them.
  2. Second you need to mimic LaTeX’s default styling. This gives the remaining half of the look, and much more complicated that the first half. It takes a bit of patience to make measurements of LaTeX spacing and translate them into Word. Here is a template. It looks kind of ugly in Word, but comes out great in pdf. The template takes reference to Laudo Ogura‘s LaTeX sample. Definitely take a look at his site if you want to learn LaTeX.

A big plus of Word 2007 is the new build-in equation editor uses a TeX-like syntax, making the transition to and from LaTeX much easier than before. On the other hand, the equation editor is also the biggest problem–you cannot use another font, and the default does not look anywhere like LaTeX’s output.

A Mother, a Sick Son and His Father, the Priest

General

link to New York Times article.

A landmark study in 1990 by the scholar A. W. Richard Sipe, a former Benedictine, found that 20 percent of Catholic priests were involved in continuing sexual relationships with women, and an additional 8 percent to 10 percent had occasional heterosexual relationships.

“It’s not so much that people don’t know it happens, but they don’t know how much it happens,”…

The most damning aspect of the incident is not that Catholic priests violate their celibacy–priests are humans after all, and all humans sin–but that the Franciscans extracted a confidentiality agreement while keeping the priest in concern on active ministry, allowing the priest to essentially live a married life for years. This is a blunt disregard of the celibacy principle and utterly irresponsible.

“We quickly discovered that many of these priests were playboys. They weren’t looking for any discernment, they were simply staying and playing…”

香港的「遮面」文化

General


昨天看到一則短片，大概是港台「頭條新開」的一部份，片中有一段是一名男子在排隊購買某「o靚模」的寫真時接受訪問。不知是有意還是無意，該名男子用印有那o靚模名子的牌子遮掩自己的臉孔。這動作不其然令我啼笑皆非。迷上人家就是了，幹嗎要表現得好像是不見得光似的？

「遮面」在香港其實真的很普遍。見到相機或攝錄機，不少人的反射動作就是遮掩自己的臉。手頭只要能用的–報紙、雨傘、大衣–通通都拿來遮。遮面在香港之普遍，已經到了大家見怪不怪的地步。但仔細想想，我也真的未曾在歐美新聞報導中見過這樣不願見人的一群。假若是在K場被警方帶走，還可以理解為何要遮面，但進出大廈，甚至像那位人兄排隊買東西時接受訪問也要遮面，就好像有點兒歇斯底里了。不願以真面目示人，自然予人心虛的感覺，讓人家覺得你在做虧心事。既無做錯，為何不能大大方方，從容面對鏡頭？

思索下去，港人要遮面，大概是對攝影者和看眾的不信任。而兩種不信任也許是二為其一。在歐美，報刊分工明確，老牌大報的副刊風趣但有品味，不賣八卦新聞。這當然不是西人清高不八卦–進去任何一間超市，收銀機旁必定有十數份不同的八卦小報在爭取目光–但人們對新聞界的操守有信心，也對新聞的讀者觀眾有信心，所以見報不是甚麼可怕的事。在香港，有怎樣的讀者就有怎樣的報章，兩份最大、讀者人數最多的報章同時也是最八卦的兩份。假若被攝進鏡頭，第二天見報搞不好就給連上不知甚麼樣的新聞，給人說三道四。更要命的是香港是一個很細小的地方，給人認出來的機會高，甚至二話不說就被人把名字電話生平全弄上網！

對傳媒不信任當然不會是好事，因為這關乎到「第四權」是否有效運作。對新聞界越不信任，對新聞自由也就越冷漠。不過相比起這樣嚴肅的話題，港人似乎還是對o靚模哪個身材好、哪個比較色有興趣一點。

Movie Picks

General

Highly Recommended: Moon
This independent production, though short–runs 97 min.–and having only one real cast–Sam Rockwell as Sam Bell(‘s)–is surprising well made. The idea of having a single human clone managing a moon base without even knowing that he is a clone, and subsequently incinerates him just as he thought he is heading back to Earth, is horrifying. Yet the film manages to deliver such feeling without resorting to any horrifying shoots–in fact, the movie is rather humorous at times. Moon has a Rotten Tomatoes rating of 88%.

Transformer: Revenge of the Fallen
Alright, how should I put it? This sequel can be best compared to what would happen if a teenage boy pools all his toys and tries to make a story out of them. Seriously, how else could you explain the involvement of infantries in hunting Deceptrons? That said, as my colleague puts it, despite being epically ridiculous, it is also epically awesome. I was chuckling right from the beginning till the end.