[Tex/LaTex] Why won’t the title information show up

titles

I'm just beginning to learn how to use latex and I already ran into a little bind. I've been using the Latex Document wiki as my guide. The editor I'm writing the typesetting in is TeXworks. So here is my code:

\documentclass[11pt, a4paper]{report}
\begin{document}
\title{it's so hard out here}
\author{your main man}
\date
\maketitle
\begin{abstract}
i'll start that right here
\end{abstract}


now it is time to g et to typesetting effectively
\end{document}

Now the problem I'm having is that my title information is not showing up when I convert to a pdf. Did I do something wrong?

Best Answer

\date needs an argument, i.e. a date, 'enclosed' with a {} pair. If this is not prevalent, \date uses the next token it can find, i.e. \maketitle in the OP's post. This is bad of course, as \date itself is not used as long \maketitle is not issued.

Principally, \date is not necessary at all if the current date is requested. (\maketitle uses \today then)

\documentclass[11pt, a4paper]{report}

\begin{document}
\title{it's so hard out here}
\author{your main man}
\date{1/1/2015}
\maketitle
\begin{abstract}
i'll start that right here
\end{abstract}


now it is time to get to typesetting effectively
\end{document}

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