document-classesfontsize
I am an eighth grader that needs some help. I am a noob at anything TeX or LaTeX, and am just starting out. I am using USBTeX, just in case that matters.
I cannot seem to change the text size in the \documentclass[]{} thingy in the beginning of the document. My TeX editor sets it to 10pt at default, but when I try to change it to something different, nothing happens. Any ideas?
For the sizes, you can use the current bounding box together with \pgfgetlastxy:
\documentclass{standalone}
\usepackage{tikz}
\newcommand*{\ExtractCoordinate}[3]{\path (#1); \pgfgetlastxy{#2}{#3};}%
\newdimen\tlx
\newdimen\tlx
\newdimen\brx
\newdimen\bry
\begin{document}
\begin{tikzpicture}
\draw (-3,-1) rectangle (3,1) (-2,-2) rectangle (2,2);
\foreach \x in {north west,south west,south east,north east}
{ \fill[red] (current bounding box.\x) circle (0.01);
}
\ExtractCoordinate{current bounding box.north west}{\tlx}{\tly}
\ExtractCoordinate{current bounding box.south east}{\brx}{\bry}
\pgfmathsetmacro{\myheight}{(+\tly-\bry)/28.452755}
\pgfmathsetmacro{\mywidth}{(-\tlx+\brx)/28.452755}
\node[below right] at (-2,1) {height: \myheight\ cm};
\node[above left] at (2,-1) {width: \mywidth\ cm};
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}
Edit 1: Ah, now I get it. Here is a still not automatic version. You set two commands in each tikzpicture:
\maximumdimensions{4}{3}, which is the desired width and height, at the beginning of the picture.
\getscalingfactors which will draw nodes with a recommended scaling factor in the middle of your picture if the image if to high/wide:
\documentclass{scrartcl}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usepackage{lipsum}
\usepackage{xifthen}
\newcommand*{\ExtractCoordinate}[3]{\path (#1); \pgfgetlastxy{#2}{#3};}%
\newdimen\tlx
\newdimen\tlx
\newdimen\brx
\newdimen\bry
\def\xscalefactor{}
\def\yscalefactor{}
\parindent0mm
\newcommand{\getscalingfactors}{%
\ExtractCoordinate{current bounding box.north west}{\tlx}{\tly}
\ExtractCoordinate{current bounding box.south east}{\brx}{\bry}
\pgfmathsetmacro{\myheight}{(+\tly-\bry)/28.452755}
\pgfmathsetmacro{\mywidth}{(-\tlx+\brx)/28.452755}
\pgfmathsetmacro{\xsf}{\maxwidth/\mywidth}
\pgfmathsetmacro{\ysf}{\maxheight/\myheight}
\global\edef\xscalefactor{\xsf}
\global\edef\yscalefactor{\ysf}
\pgfmathtruncatemacro{\xsfc}{\xsf*10000}
\pgfmathtruncatemacro{\ysfc}{\ysf*10000}
\ifthenelse{\xsfc > 10000}{}{\node[fill=white,above] at (current bounding box.center) {x-s: \xsf};}
\ifthenelse{\ysfc > 10000}{}{\node[fill=white,below] at (current bounding box.center) {y-s: \ysf};}
}
\newcommand{\maximumdimensions}[2]{% width, height
\global\edef\maxwidth{#1} % in cm
\global\edef\maxheight{#2} % in cm
}
\begin{document}
\begin{tikzpicture}[scale=1]
\maximumdimensions{4}{3}
\draw[fill=orange] (-3,-1) rectangle (3,1) (-2,-2) rectangle (2,2);
\getscalingfactors
\end{tikzpicture}
\lipsum[1]
\begin{tikzpicture}[scale=1]
\maximumdimensions{4}{3}
\draw[fill=orange!50!gray] (0,0) circle (3);
\draw[fill=red!50!gray] (3,1) circle (1);
\draw[fill=blue!50!gray] (-2,2) circle (1);
\draw[fill=green!50!gray] (-3,-2) circle (1);
\draw[fill=yellow!50!gray] (2,-1) circle (1);
\getscalingfactors
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}
If you scale the picture down enough, the nodes inside the picture vanish:
\begin{tikzpicture}[scale=0.66] and \begin{tikzpicture}[scale=0.497]
The "fallback"-message is simply an information. And you can avoid the size substitution by loading the package fix-cm. Then fontsize=9.5pt should work fine.
You don't get substituation warnings with fontsize=0.96 as the LaTeX-kernel defines \def\fontsubfuzz{.4pt}. So latex will inform you of font substitution only if the size declared in the fd file differ from the one you are trying to use by more than 0.4pt. (9pt and 10pt are declared by default). With fix-cm all size are declared so all warnings will disappear.
Best Answer
The only sizes supported by the document class option in the standard classes are 10pt 11pt and 12pt. To get text at other sizes you can use commands such as
\largeor\tinywithin the document. Normally though you should not be using font size commands within a document. Heading commands such as\sectionand other structural markup should be defined by the class to use an appropriate size. One of the aims of LaTeX is that you should as far as possible be using structural markup such as\sectionand\subsectionand not using explicit font and size changes, which make it a lot harder to reformat your document for different purposes.