University of Maryland Ph.D. Dissertation Help Page

This page is intended to be a quick reference for writing your Ph.D. dissertation using the latex document class "dissertation.cls".  This is mainly a page for using the latex frontend program called LyX to write your thesis.  Below I have listed the necessary files to accomplish this task.

           diss_skeleton.lyx
           dissertation.cls
           lyxfix_diss
           sed_script

LyX is available on GLUE machines by tapping "tetex" at a GLUE prompt

    >>tap tetex
    >>lyx diss_skeleton.lyx &

This launches LyX opening the dissertation skeleton that I have provided.  Replace the information with your own information and write your thesis.  Tables and figures can be included right in the text.

Once you are finished editing your thesis, simply go to File->Export>As Latex to export your LyX file to a latex file. This will create a file "diss_skeleton.tex", assuming that you have not renamed the LyX file.  At the GLUE prompt, simply type

    >>lyxfix_diss diss_skeleton

Make sure that the file "lyxfix_diss" is executable. This can be done in UNIX by typing

    >>chmod u+x lyxfix_diss

"lyxfix_diss" is a simple shell script that slightly modifies the "diss_skeleton.tex" file to allow latex to compile the file using the "dissertation.cls".  The modifications are done using the "sed_script" file.  "lyxfix_diss" then runs latex twice and generates the postscript file for viewing.

Comments on the "lyx" file
    To change the advisor name, committee names, and department go to Layout->Latex Preamble.  This would also be the place where you can define your own latex commands.  The "diss_skeleton.lyx" defines a boldfaced gradient expression.

Comments on the "dissertation.cls" file
    If your thesis does not contain any figures or tables then you should not have a List of Figures or List of Tables page.  It seems that the dissertation class is supposed to be able to detect this, but it didn't work for me.  So to remedy the situation, you can simply go into "dissertation.cls" and comment out the following lines in the \def\makefrontmatter{....} section

            \ifhastables \makelistoftables \fi   goes to  % \ifhastables\makelistoftables \fi

and similarly for \ifhasfigures.

Last updated: May 15, 2000

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