Maintainers: Dr. Mike McAllister and Dr. Vlado Keselj
To send questions or comments please contact:
Dr. Vlado Keselj
Main URL of this site: http://web.cs.dal.ca/~vlado/dalcsthesis/
dalcsthesis.cls, examples/simple.tex, examples/simple.bib, examples/simple.pdf, examples/simple.ps, examples/figures.tex, examples/figures.pdf, examples/dalcsthesis.cls, examples/samplefig.eps, examples/samplefig.pdf, examples/graphicx.sty, examples/subfigure.sty, examples/tables.tex, examples/tables.pdf, examples/algorithm.tex, examples/algorithm.pdf, examples/algorithm.sty, examples/algorithmic.sty, examples/theorems.tex, examples/theorems.pdf, examples/nzproof.sty, examples/nzproof.tex, examples/nzproof.pdf, example-glossary/glossary.tex, example-glossary/glossary.sty, example-glossary/glossary.pdf, example-big/thesis.pdf, example-big/thesis.tex, example-phd/phd-example.tex, example-phd/phd-example.bib, example-phd/phd-example.pdf, dalthesis.pdf, styles.css, afterpage.sty, and index.html.
For more files and explanations, please read further. .section:toc Table of Contents
Download Files
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
1.1 FGS Regulations
1.2 Other LaTeX Templates
1.3 Overview of Main Commands
1.4 Caveats
1.5 Current Issues
1.6 Questions and Comments
2. Examples of Parts to a Thesis
2.1 Front Pages
2.2 Figures
2.3 Tables
2.4 Algorithms
2.5 Theorems
2.6 Glossary
3. Notes on Changes and Previous Versions
3.1 Acknowledgements
3.2 Update History
3.3 Previous Saved Versions
Last update
The final thesis format is approved by the Faculty of Graduate Studies office. Although this format is regularely maintained in effort to keep it up to date with the prescribed FGS guidelines, it is possible that additional corrections will be required. The students are responsible for ensuring that their final thesis conforms to the FGS regulations, especially since LaTeX allows the author to override many aspects of the template within their own text. Hence, make sure that you have your thesis format checked by FGS before trying to submit the final copy of your thesis. This evaluation takes two business days.
The FGS thesis regulations can be found at http://www.dalgrad.dal.ca/regulations/ix/. Further thesis format guidelines, including sample theses documents in Word format, are provided at: http://dalgrad.dal.ca/currentstudents/thesesanddefences/forms/#regs.
This template is provided as an example of something that FGS will accept. Students are welcome to make their thesis look as they want, whether by using their own template or by modifying this one, but always have your thesis format checked by FGS before trying to submit the final copy of your thesis.
.subsection:introduction-2 1.2 Other LaTeX TemplatesAt an ad-hoc committee meeting on Jun 14, 2012, it was decided that a common Dalhousie LaTeX thesis template to be created. As a first step, here is the list of current LaTeX thesis templates being used at the Dalhousie University (if you would like to add any more, please email Vlado Keselj at vlado@cs.dal.ca):
The LaTeX template for CS thesis of the Dalhousie Univerisity is based on version 2.2 of the thesis template for theses in Mathematics. The math template was developed by Clyde Clements and Steven Matheson. The basic usage of the CS template is the same as for the math one. See instructions at www.mscs.dal.ca/~clyde/dalthesis or the basic simple.tex starter file to get started and for the regular bells and whistles.
Declare your supervisor with a \supervisor{} statement and each reader with a \reader{} statement. If you have co-supervisors, declare each of them with a separate \supervisor{} statement and the template will designate them as co-supervisors.
The basic template allows you to not print out the front pages if you include a \nofront command in your file. You can omit specific parts with the following commands: \notitlepage, \nosignaturepage, \nopermissionpage \nodedicationpage, \notableofcontents, \nolistoftables, \nolistoffigures, or \nobib. You can also declare a "draft" version of the thesis with the \draft command.
You can browse the file dalcsthesis.cls to find all degree tags. The following ones are relevant to the Faculty of Computer Science:
Use one of these designations before your \frontmatter call and it will define the appropriate abbreviations for your thesis.
The CS thesis file relies on some additional style files. All of them should be available on the CS systems. If a required style file is not available, you can place their copies in the directory with your thesis.
Basic files needed are:
Simple.tex (pdf, ps) is a sample basic thesis (you also need its bibliography file simple.bib).
The rest of this page provides information on including different features in your thesis like a glossary, tables, or figures. They are all presented as changes to simple.tex. Taking a UNIX "diff" between simple.tex and the example will show you the items that change to use the given feature.
.subsection:introduction-c 1.4 CaveatsFGS guidelines specify that the left-side margin should be around 1.5 inches and other three margins approximately 1 inch. The thesis style file is designed to satisfy this requirement but, as Clyde Clements mentions in the math version of the thesis template, you may print the thesis generated by this template and get incorrect margins. Known reasons are
The easiest way to tell if your margins are correct after printing is to measure where the page number appears at the bottom of a page. The template is designed to print it between 0.5 inches and 0.75 inches from the bottom of the page. If the margin is bigger than that then your method of printing the dvi file has shrunk the margins.
.subsection:introduction-b 1.5 Current IssuesAlthough an effort is made to keep the template in accordance with the latest FGS regulations, it happens that a thesis using the template does not conform to some requirements. We greatly appreciate any reports about the corrections, and our first step is to list such issues in this subsection. Additionally, we report here any other reported problems.
\usepackage{listings}
\makeatletter
\def\dal@chapter[#1]#2{%
\ifnum \c@secnumdepth >\m@ne\refstepcounter{chapter}%
\typeout{\@chapapp\space\thechapter.}%
\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}%
{\protect\numberline{\@chapapp\space\thechapter}#1}%
\else\addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{#1}%
\fi\chaptermark{#1}%
\addtocontents{lof}{\protect\addvspace{10\p@}}%
\addtocontents{lot}{\protect\addvspace{10\p@}}%
\if@twocolumn\@topnewpage[\@makechapterhead{#2}]%
\else\@makechapterhead{#2}%
\@afterheading\fi%
%\ifdal@in@preface\else\afterpage{\dal@add@textheight{\footskip}}\fi%
}
\makeatother
This should be done just before the first code appendix chapter.
Thanks to Mike Lawrence for reporting this problem.
One solution can be illustrated as follows:
\section[This Section Title is Very Close to the Length of Two Lines
in the Table of Contents---There Should be Two Dots at the End of
ToC Line~.~.]
{This Section Title is Very Close to the Length of Two Lines
in the Table of Contents---There Should be Two Dots at the End of
ToC Line}
This is a trick to repeat the title for the short and long version, but we add ~.~. in the "short" version.
This makes the title in the Table of Contents longer, and makes sure that there are at least
two dots in the dotted line, as required.
\caption[caption title]{actual caption text}
instead of
\caption{caption text}
In the first case only the caption title will appear in the table of
contents. The first usage is encouraged if the caption text takes
more than one line.
The thesis format is currently maintained by Mike McAllister and Vlado Keselj. If you have any questions and comments please send e-mail to Vlado Keselj (vlado@cs.dal.ca), or talk to him directly.
According to current regulations, an abstract should occupy a single page. It may be typeset in the single space mode, if necessary. To obtain the single-space mode you need to specify the beginning tag as:
\begin{abstract}[s]
instead of the usual
\begin{abstract}
The abstract should have no illustrations or footnotes, and it should
be no longer than 150 words for a Master's thesis, and not longer than
350 words for a PhD thesis. This is not a strict requirement, but it
is required by the catalogues: the AMICUS Web on-line catalogue and
Dissertations Abstracts International database.
The example included here uses two LaTeX subpackages: graphicx and subfigure. The graphicx package is quite common and useful to include external images. The current FGS requirements (2011-04) require that a thesis is submitted in the PDF format, for the electronic submission, and it should be PDF/A compliant. This requires that all fonts are embedded, among other requirements. To obtain such format, it is recommended that you use pdflatex, instead of producing a DVI file and then a PS file. All EPS figures need to be converted to PDF as well. You can use epstopdf command (in Linux environment) to convert an EPS figure to PDF. For example, to convert a f.eps file to pdf, type "epstopdf f.eps", and it will produce "f.pdf" file, usable as a figure by pdflatex.
This example uses two sub-packages: graphicx and subfigure. graphicx is a standard package that gives you everything you need for figures. The subfigure package is used here to place more than one picture (each with their own caption) within one figure.
Diff with "simple.tex" (< means a line was removed, > means that a line was added):
% diff simple.tex figures.tex
1,2c1,2
< % simple.tex - simple Master's thesis sample
< % $Id: simple.tex 309 2011-01-28 14:46:48Z vlado $
---
> % dalcsthesis examples/figures.tex
> % $Id: figures.tex 307 2011-01-21 14:00:38Z vlado $
4,5c4,7
< % to prepare draft version use option draft:
< %\documentclass[12pt,draft]{dalcsthesis}
---
>
> %Figures -- these packages let you do some extra things with figures.
> \usepackage[dvips]{graphicx}
> \usepackage{subfigure}
7a10
>
13,14c16,17
< \defenceyear{2010}
< \convocation{May}{2011}
---
> \defenceyear{2006}
> \convocation{May}{2007}
60a64,90
>
> Every dissertation should consider having nice figures like Figure~\ref{fig-steiner_growth}.
>
> \begin{figure}
> \centering
> {\includegraphics[height = 3.0 in]{samplefig}}
> \caption{\label{fig-steiner_growth} Growth patterns for Steiner
> graph versus original lattice. Note the logarithmic scale.}
> \end{figure}
>
> Sometimes it is useful to group figures together.
> Figure~\ref{fig-partial_compare} is an example of using the subfigure style.
>
> \begin{figure}
> \centering
> \subfigure[Caption A]{\includegraphics[width = 2.75 in]{samplefig}}\qquad
> \subfigure[Caption B]{\includegraphics[width = 2.75 in]{samplefig}}\qquad
> \subfigure[Caption C]{\includegraphics[width = 2.75 in]{samplefig}}\qquad
> \subfigure[Caption D]{\includegraphics[width = 2.75 in]{samplefig}}
> \caption{\label{fig-partial_compare}Relative weight reduction for the
> schedule trees produced on subsets of size (a) 10\% (b) 25\% (c)
> 50\% (d) 75\%. The baseline in this case is chosen as the
> smaller of (i) a sort of the raw data set for each view or (ii)
> computation of the full cube.}
> \end{figure}
>
> Thanks to Todd Eavis for providing the figures and usage method for the package.
Tables have native support in LaTeX. This one uses a tabular inner environment to give a pretty layout to the data.
Diff with "simple.tex" (< means a line was removed, > means that a line was added):
% diff simple.tex tables.tex
1,2c1
< % simple.tex - simple Master's thesis sample
< % $Id: simple.tex 309 2011-01-28 14:46:48Z vlado $
---
> % Version 2006-12-05
4,5d2
< % to prepare draft version use option draft:
< %\documentclass[12pt,draft]{dalcsthesis}
7a5
>
13,14c11,12
< \defenceyear{2010}
< \convocation{May}{2011}
---
> \defenceyear{2006}
> \convocation{May}{2007}
23c21
< \nolistoftables
---
>
60a59,77
>
> Tables are native to LaTeX. Table~\ref{tab-steiner_growth} shows a
> tabular environment within a table.
>
> \begin{table}[tbh]
> \centering
> \begin{tabular}{|r|r|r|r|r|}
> \hline
> Dimensions & Lattice Nodes & Lattice Edges & Steiner Nodes & Steiner Edges \\
> \hline \hline
> 3 & 8 & 12 & 16 & 117 \\
> \hline
> 4 & 16 & 32 & 65 & 1948 \\
> \hline
> \end{tabular}
> \caption{\label{tab-steiner_growth}Growth patterns for Steiner
> graph versus original lattice in tabular form}
> \end{table}
>
This example uses two sub-packages: algorithm and algorithmic. There are other algorithm packages that exist that you might consider too. The algorithms don't appear in any table of contents unless you enclose them in a figure environment.
Diff with "simple.tex" (< means a line was removed, > means that a line was added):
% diff simple.tex tables.tex
1,2c1
< % simple.tex - simple Master's thesis sample
< % $Id: simple.tex 309 2011-01-28 14:46:48Z vlado $
---
> % Version 2006-12-05
4,5c3,6
< % to prepare draft version use option draft:
< %\documentclass[12pt,draft]{dalcsthesis}
---
>
> % Algorithms
> \usepackage{algorithmic}
> \usepackage{algorithm}
7a9
>
13,14c15,16
< \defenceyear{2010}
< \convocation{May}{2011}
---
> \defenceyear{2006}
> \convocation{May}{2007}
60a63,103
>
> \begin{algorithm}
>
> \caption{Add Non Essential Views}
> \label{alg-add_non_essential_views}
>
> \begin{algorithmic}[1]
>
> \INPUT A tree $E$ consisting of the selected group-bys, and a
> guiding graph $G$. Also used are auxiliary variables $BP$
> (best plan) and $CP$ (current plan).
>
> \OUTPUT Reduced tree $R$.
>
> \COMMENT{Add nodes from $G - R$ to $E$ as long as the total
> cost improves}
>
> \REPEAT
> \STATE clear $BP$
>
> \FOR{every $v \: in \: G - R$}
> \STATE clear $CP$
> \STATE $CP.node = v$
> \STATE {\sf FindBestParent(R, CP)}
> \STATE {\sf FindBestChildren(R, CP)}
>
> \IF{ {\em CP.benefit\/} $>$ {\em BP.benefit\/} }
> \STATE $BP = CP$
> \ENDIF
> \ENDFOR
>
> \IF{ {\em BP.benefit\/} $> 0$}
> \STATE add $BP.node$ to $R$ and update $R$ accordingly
> \ENDIF
>
> \UNTIL{ {\em BP.benefit\/} $<= 0$}
>
> \end{algorithmic}
> \end{algorithm}
>
> Thanks to Todd Eavis for providing the sample algorithm.
The example theorems.tex (pdf) illustrates how we can write definitions, theorems, proofs, and other similar parts in LaTeX.
Diff with "simple.tex" (< means a line was removed, > means that a line was added):
% diff simple.tex theorems.tex
1,2c1
< % simple.tex - simple Master's thesis sample
< % $Id: simple.tex 309 2011-01-28 14:46:48Z vlado $
---
> % Version 2006-12-05
4,5c3,11
< % to prepare draft version use option draft:
< %\documentclass[12pt,draft]{dalcsthesis}
---
>
> % Definitions, Theorems, Lemmas, etc.
> \newtheorem{definition}{Definition}
> \newtheorem{theorem}{Theorem}
> \newtheorem{lemma}{Lemma}
>
> % A simple proof environment
> \newenvironment{proof}{\paragraph{Proof.}}
> {\nopagebreak\hfill\nopagebreak\rule{2mm}{2mm}\par\bigskip}
7a14
>
13,14c20,21
< \defenceyear{2010}
< \convocation{May}{2011}
---
> \defenceyear{2006}
> \convocation{May}{2007}
57a65,76
>
> Theorem~\ref{theorem-sample} is a sample theorem.
>
> \begin{theorem}[Optional title] \label{theorem-sample}
> This is a theorem!
> \end{theorem}
>
> \begin{proof}
> This is the proof.
>
> Here comes the Q.E.D. (quod erat demonstrandum) box.
> \end{proof}
For proofs and proof sketches you can also use the style package written by Norbert Zeh, nzproof.sty. The package requires the following other style files: amsmath.sty, amssymb.sty, amsfonts.sty, and ifthen.sty, which are likely already installed on the system. This example shows how nzproof style file can be used. Thanks to Norbert Zeh for providing the style file and the sample LaTeX source.
Diff with "simple.tex" (< means a line was removed, > means that a line was added):
% diff simple.tex nzproof.tex
1,2c1
< % simple.tex - simple Master's thesis sample
< % $Id: simple.tex 309 2011-01-28 14:46:48Z vlado $
---
> % Version 2006-12-05
4,5c3,12
< % to prepare draft version use option draft:
< %\documentclass[12pt,draft]{dalcsthesis}
---
>
> %Theorem
> \usepackage{nzproof,theorem}
> \newtheorem{theorem}{Theorem}
> \newtheorem{proposition}{Proposition}
> \newtheorem{lemma}{Lemma}
> \newtheorem{definition}{Definition}
> \newtheorem{observation}{Observation}
> \newtheorem{corollary}{Corollary}
> \newtheorem{problem}{Problem}
7a15
>
13,14c21,22
< \defenceyear{2010}
< \convocation{May}{2011}
---
> \defenceyear{2006}
> \convocation{May}{2007}
60a69,104
>
> Theorem~\ref{theorem-greatest} is a sample theorem. You could equally well
> make it a lemma, definition, proposition, observation, corollary, or problem.
>
> \begin{theorem}
>
> \label{theorem-greatest}
>
> This is the greatest theorem!
>
> \end{theorem}
>
> \begin{pf}
> Trivial. Just admire it obvious correctness! Sometimes you just have to
> make things short enough that people believe the result right away.
>
> Then there are other times like this one where you're waiving your hands
> wildly and hoping that nobody notices...but they always do.
>
> Ending here, if I leave a blank line before the endproof line then the
> box appears on a separate line. If I leave no line, like now, the box
> comes at the end of this line.
> \end{pf}
>
> Or, you can do a proof sketch:
>
> \begin{ps}
> Just waive your hands around and make it look convincing.
> \end{ps}
>
> Another alternative is to give a label to your proof, which can also be
> done to proof sketches:
>
> \begin{pf}[Theorem~\ref{theorem-greatest}]
> This is a delated proof to a result stated earlier in the text.
> \end{pf}
This example creates a glossary. The example uses the file glossary.sty, which may be installed on your system, or you can download it from here. To create a glossary, you first LaTeX the file, then issue the command:
makeindex -s glossary.ist -o glossary.gls glossary.gloand finally LaTeX the file once more.
In a thesis, as well as in this example, the location of the glossary is dictated by the Faculty of Graduate Studies: it must be between the abstract and the acknowledgements.
Diff with "simple.tex" (< means a line was removed, > means that a line was added):
% diff simple.tex glossary.tex
1,5c1,2
< % simple.tex - simple Master's thesis sample
< % $Id: simple.tex 309 2011-01-28 14:46:48Z vlado $
< \documentclass[12pt]{dalcsthesis}
< % to prepare draft version use option draft:
< %\documentclass[12pt,draft]{dalcsthesis}
---
> % Version 2006-12-05
> \documentclass[12pt,glossary]{dalcsthesis}
7a5
>
13,14c11,12
< \defenceyear{2010}
< \convocation{May}{2011}
---
> \defenceyear{2006}
> \convocation{May}{2007}
31a30,31
> \printglossary
>
48,50c48,50
< preparation,
< methodology,
< forethought,
---
> preparation\glossary{name={Preparation},description={Getting ready to do something}},
> methodology\glossary{name={Methodology},description={The way to do something methodically}},
> forethought\glossary{name={Forethought},description={Thinking ahead}},
52c52
< analysis
---
> analysis\glossary{name={Analysis},description={Looking back at what you did to see what did or didn't work}}
The CS template arose out of the efforts of many people. Particular thanks go to the following contributors:
Last update: 14-Jun-2012.