LUG: LaTeX problem with bar/overline - Wed, 02 Feb 2011 09:24:56 -0500

Subject : LUG: LaTeX problem with bar/overline

From : "Daniel Underwood" <daniel.underwood@ncsu.[redacted]>

Date : Wed, 02 Feb 2011 09:24:56 -0500

Hope this isn't too off-topic. I know many of you guys are familiar
with LaTeX, so I figured I'd ask.

There doesn't appear to be a way to correctly typeset a line above a
symbol to denote, for example, the sample mean of a random variable.
That is, I can't figure out a way to correctly display X-bar (X with a
line over it denoting the mean of random variable X). There are two
ways that I know of to do this: \bar{X} and \overline{X}. But each of
these is flawed. One is far too small (FYI: this also happens with
\hat{X}), and one is ridiculously large. Here is how each of these
looks: <http://mathbin.net/58379>

Now, in the Windows (and apparently Mac) world, there is a solution:
MathTime Pro II fonts: <http://www.pctex.com/mtpro2.html>

One of my professors uses this, and things look perfect. I tried to use
this with my standard texlive installation (on Ubuntu), but I couldn't
get it to work. If any of you could get it to work (there's a free Lite
version available on the website), please please tell me how! Or if
anyone knows an alternative way to display X-bar, please let me know.

This, to me, is extremely troubling. This notation is prevalent, and I
find it shocking that there doesn't appear to be a way to typeset it
correctly.

TIA,
Daniel
--
Daniel Underwood
North Carolina State University
PhD Student - Industrial Engineering
email: daniel.underwood@ncsu.[redacted]
phone: XXX.302.3291
fax: XXX.515.5281
web: http://www4.ncsu.edu/~djunderw/

Replies :