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I'm writing my Bachelor's thesis in \LaTeX and I noticed e.g. Python and Matplotlib have a preferred reference they want you to cite to acknowledge the project as a whole. What is the best/most formal reference I should cite when I want to acknowledge the developers and the community as a whole?

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  • I think cite is the wrong term here, since you don't cite anything. But you can add somewhere: The typesetting was done with LaTeX. If you like, use \LaTeX instead.
    – Johannes_B
    May 16, 2016 at 8:38
  • @Johannes_B Actually, you may use LaTeX only when \LaTeX is not available.
    – Henri Menke
    May 16, 2016 at 8:41
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    You could cite the user guides of the packages you used, i.e. when you write in your acknowledgements “graphics with PGF/TikZ”, then cite pgfmanual.pdf. In general this very uncommon though.
    – Henri Menke
    May 16, 2016 at 8:44
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    If really want to give something back to the community then become a member of your local TeX user group or of TUG.
    – Henri Menke
    May 16, 2016 at 8:46
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    @percusse :No, I wouldn't have, because I'm not grateful for Microsoft Word. Not only does it require buying the software, it isn't open to contributions from the community and it's simply a pain in the neck to work with. I want to acknowledge LaTeX because the community provides a superior typesetting system for free, with awesome community driven support.
    – ByteMe
    May 16, 2016 at 10:49

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Since it's a thesis and therefore an official document, if you want to say that your thesis was done in Latex (and so on), there's the colophon.

From Wikipedia:

In publishing, a colophon is a brief statement containing information about the publication of a book such as the place of publication, the publisher, and the date of publication. A colophon may also be emblematic or pictorial in nature.

I'd use that. Actually I did use that in my own thesis, and — to be precise — I chose a rotated triangle shape. I still placed it at the end of my document though, after my bibliography.

There are many other shapes and you could choose no shape at all (just search images for "colophon"), but a simple paragraph seemed so bland to me, so I went for the triangle which still retains some sobriety.

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  • link to rotated triangle shape is dead.
    – naphaneal
    May 16, 2016 at 10:00
  • @naphaneal Ops! Fixed.
    – Alenanno
    May 16, 2016 at 10:08
  • Thanks for the colophon suggestion! I guess it's also a good place to provide a bibtex entry for my own thesis if anyone wants to cite my work?
    – ByteMe
    May 16, 2016 at 10:43
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    @ByteMe I haven't used it like that, so I don't know the answer to that question. But I'm sure that if that was the case, you'd find examples of colophons showing that. I merely wrote that I used Latex, the packages as well as my own modifications, the font, etc.
    – Alenanno
    May 16, 2016 at 10:48
  • @Alenanno : I would put the colophon and the Bibtex entry on the same page.
    – ByteMe
    May 16, 2016 at 10:50

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