Making graphics suitable for inclusion in LaTeX
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Always have a "generic Postscript" printer set up. This can either be
set to print to the "FILE" port, or just set it up as a normal
printer, and choose "print to file" when exporting your graphics.

Excel Graphs
  -- make font sizes are reasonable: Arial 10pt (bold preferred), with
     AutoScale off
  -- make background of plot area white, so points can be seen
  -- From Excel, select the chart, Page Setup, Chart, Scale to Fit
    Page, Black & White, Print, select PS printer, Properties, Portrait,
    Advanced, check that PS Options/Output Option is set to EPS, OK OK OK.
  -- open file in ghostscript and use cursor to determine bounding box
  info (though if we're always using fit to page in Excel, this
  shouldn't need adjusting very often)


Screen Shots or other Images
 -- take a screen shot of the window (Alt+PrintScreen) 
    or full screen (Ctrl+PrintScreen) 
 -- paste the image into Word
 -- Select the image
 -- File/Print
 -- Choose "print selection", choose a PostScript printer, check print to file
 -- Then go into the printer properties, advanced, and make sure the PS
    Options/Output option is set to EPS
 -- OK, OK, OK


Referencing the graphic from within LaTeX
------------------------------------------

It can be a pain to get the spacing correct for a graphic. Below is
the code I use. You may have to adjust the bounding box coordinates
(bbllx, etc.) a bit. The ones given are suitable for graphics exported
from Excel as described above. If your figure isn't showing up, try
opening the eps file in GhostView and checking the coordinates.

\begin{figure}
\vspace*{-.25in}
\begin{center}
\mbox{\psfig{file=myGreatGraph.eps,width=.7\columnwidth,bbllx=49pt,bblly=207pt,bburx=561pt,bbury=588pt}}
\end{center}
\vspace*{-.25in}
\caption{\label{myGreatGraph}
A wonderful caption describing the graph.}
\end{figure}


Compiling LaTeX into a PDF
--------------------------

pdftex doesn't always work

dvipdf works, but be sure to check that the line breaks are correct,
since it may be using different fonts