Template for a Ph.D. thesis at the University of Michigan. The template is based on the Komascript scrbook class and is intended to be a modern, lightweight, and customizable alternative to the different rac.sty-based classes (the original rac.sty was created in 1988!). Example of complete thesis: https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/handle/2027.42/140897.
- Follows Rackham requirements (open an issue or a PR if this is no longer the case)
- List of acronyms (
glossariespackage) - List of appendices
- Clutter-free main files
- Easy font selection
The recommended tex environment is TexLive. If you don't have the full installation, some packages might have to be installed manually to compile the template:
tlmgr install koma-script xetex morewrites mathdots booktabs setspace textcase datatool xstring todonotes chngcntr xpatch doublestroke glossaries mfirstuc xfor biblatex biber pgf pgfplots unicode-math lipsum
The template can be compiled with latexmk using settings defined in latexmkrc. The default compiler is xelatex (to use pdflatex the fontspec package must be removed in preamble.tex).
latexmk um-thesis.tex
Alternatively, use an environment like Sublime Text + LatexTools that relies on latexmk for compilation.
The template works in Overleaf as of November 2018; just set the compiler to XeLaTeX in the project settings (or remove the fontspec package and use the default compiler pdfLaTeX). I don't know how tikzexternalize is handled in these environments, so the \tikzexternalize[prefix=figures_compiled/] command in preamble.tex should probably be left disabled. Custom fonts will also have to be uploaded to overleaf.
The Koma-Script Bundle is highly customizable, see the Koma-Script guide for detailed descriptions.
Fonts are handled with fontspec/unicode-math and the \setmainfont{} and \setmathfont{} commands. For finer control, use the \setkomafont{element} commands (for a full list of customizable elements, see Chapter 3.6 of the Koma-Script guide). Suggested font collections:
- Libertinus: https://github.com/libertinus-fonts/libertinus
- XITS family (no sans): https://github.com/alif-type/xits
- Linux Libertine/Linux Biolinum (no math)
- Minion Pro/Myriad Pro/Minion math (non-free)
The title page template is taken from the thesis-umich.cls derivation of rac.sty.