[Tex/LaTex] Shortcuts and/or user-defined shortcuts for math symbols in LaTeX

macrosmath-modepackages

I am very new to being able to use LaTeX to type up mathematical papers, and I just got my "system" set up. Currently I have installed TexWorks, and MikTex, and I have put together a 'hello world' article which seems to run well.

I have also used the syntax "\usepackage{amsmath}" and "\usepackage{amssymb}" in the beginning of my .tex file to write math symbols, only because some online tutorial said so.

My question is, firstly, are those the only packages I need to use for writing math, and secondly, I remember reading about some shortcuts(?) that can be used for writing math symbols, and/or user defined shortcuts that can be 'set' in the beginning so as to reduce the amount of LaTeX code needed to write mathematical symbols. However, I do not know if this is true, and if it is, how to go about 'installing' such a thing.

Does such a thing exist? Am I able to make my own shortcuts?

Thanks!

Best Answer

You surely can define your shortcuts; indeed you should.

Let's make some examples. Suppose your document is full of Fourier transforms, for which you need a fancy F. Instead of writing every time

$\mathcal{F}(f)$

it's surely better to define a new command, say

\newcommand{\FT}{\mathcal{F}}

(choose any name you like), so that you can type

$\FT(f)$

and get the same result as before, with a big bonus! If you change your mind about the notation, you can simply modify the definition.

Another example. The "gradient" operator is not predefined; so you might want to have a command for it:

\DeclareMathOperator{\grad}{grad}

A different one; my preferred notation for vectors is, say, \mathbf{v}. However, since conventions are different, I never type vectors in that way, but prefer to have

\newcommand{\vect}[1]{\mathbf{#1}}

for the same reason as before; I might change my mind and want to modify the appearance, say for using bold italic; this would be accomplished just by saying

\usepackage{bm}

and changing the above into

\newcommand{\vect}[1]{\bm{#1}}

How do you organize this? Here's an example:

\documentclass[a4paper]{book}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc} % input encoding UTF-8

% Useful packages
\usepackage{amsmath,amssymb,amsthm}

% add all the packages you need

% Personal definitions

\newcommand{\FT}{\mathcal{F}}      % Fourier transform operator
\DeclareMathOperator{\grad}{grad}  % gradient
\newcommand{\vect}[1]{\mathbf{#1}} % vectors and matrices

\begin{document}

...

\end{document}

Add definitions while you find that they are useful for distinguishing logical units of your document.

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