How they test – Papeeria, ShareLaTeX, and Overleaf
Ooh La LaTeX
© Lead Image © Zoya Fedorova, 123RF.com
Authors who publish documents or books with LaTeX can tap into online services using modern browsers, on both desktop and mobile devices, and as a collaborative tool.
Users who have come to understand and appreciate the advantages of a typesetting program like LaTeX [1] prefer to use it exclusively when drafting text. These same users also want it to be available for everyday use on all of their devices. In fact, various possibilities do exist for installing the program on tablets and the like. However, the installation process comes with numerous problems. Consequently, even experienced users are not always able to complete installation successfully without apps like TeX Writer [2] or VerbTeX [3] already running on the target platform.
Therefore, the idea of using LaTeX in an online browser is appealing, because it is a simple and elegant solution that gets around the problems encountered when installing other applications. Additionally, online access makes it possible to work in groups and take advantage of versioning. In this article, I examine three candidates – Papeeria [4], ShareLaTeX [5], and Overleaf [6] – to see whether online services offer faultless capabilities or whether users are forced to accept restrictions so painful that they forego using the services altogether.
Building, distributing, and maintaining this type of online service is a complicated endeavor. Not everybody is up to the task, as is evident from the failures experienced by such services as Fidus Writer [7], FlyLaTeX [8], SpanDeX [9], LaTeX Lab [10], and MonkeyTeX.
[...]
Buy this article as PDF
(incl. VAT)
Buy Linux Magazine
US / Canada
UK / Australia
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
TuxCare Announces Support for AlmaLinux 9.2
Thanks to TuxCare, AlmaLinux 9.2 (and soon version 9.6) now enjoys years of ongoing patching and compliance.
-
Go-Based Botnet Attacking IoT Devices
Using an SSH credential brute-force attack, the Go-based PumaBot is exploiting IoT devices everywhere.
-
Plasma 6.5 Promises Better Memory Optimization
With the stable Plasma 6.4 on the horizon, KDE has a few new tricks up its sleeve for Plasma 6.5.
-
KaOS 2025.05 Officially Qt5 Free
If you're a fan of independent Linux distributions, the team behind KaOS is proud to announce the latest iteration that includes kernel 6.14 and KDE's Plasma 6.3.5.
-
Linux Kernel 6.15 Now Available
The latest Linux kernel is now available with several new features/improvements and the usual bug fixes.
-
Microsoft Makes Surprising WSL Announcement
In a move that might surprise some users, Microsoft has made Windows Subsystem for Linux open source.
-
Red Hat Releases RHEL 10 Early
Red Hat quietly rolled out the official release of RHEL 10.0 a bit early.
-
openSUSE Joins End of 10
openSUSE has decided to not only join the End of 10 movement but it also will no longer support the Deepin Desktop Environment.
-
New Version of Flatpak Released
Flatpak 1.16.1 is now available as the latest, stable version with various improvements.
-
IBM Announces Powerhouse Linux Server
IBM has unleashed a seriously powerful Linux server with the LinuxONE Emperor 5.