Getting Started with PreTeXt

Write, Preview, and Publish in Two Hours

Geoff Cox
Applied Mathematics @ Virginia Military Institute

May 3, 2026

Welcome

Thanks for being here. Over the next two hours, you will author, build, and publish a small lesson using PreTeXt entirely in your web browser.

This workshop assumes you are:

  • An instructor curious about authoring your own course materials
  • New to PreTeXt.
  • Comfortable editing text and navigating a browser

What You Will Leave With

By the end of this session, you will have:

A working authoring setup

Running in your browser, ready to use again tomorrow.

A small lesson you wrote yourself

Built from real PreTeXt source, on a topic you actually teach.

A shareable link

A public URL you can send to a colleague or a student.

That’s the whole goal. Everything else is a bonus.

What Is PreTeXt?

PreTeXt is a free, open-source authoring system for textbooks, lecture notes, worksheets, and articles.

The key idea is simple: you describe what your content is, such as a definition, an example, or an exercise, and PreTeXt decides how it should look.

One source file. Many polished outputs.

Write Once, Publish Everywhere

From a single PreTeXt source, you can generate:

  • An interactive website
  • A print-ready PDF
  • An ePub for e-readers
  • Accessible alternative formats when students need them

You write your content once. When tomorrow’s format comes along, your source is ready for it.

Why Instructors Care

Accessibility by default

Screen-reader friendly, keyboard navigable, and ready for students who need alternative formats, all without extra work from you.

Your content, your control

Free, open, and yours to adapt, remix, and share.

Built for the long run

Structured source that will still be usable in ten years.

If You Know , You Have a Head Start

Much of what you already know transfers directly.

Inline math

 

$*$


<m>*</m>

Displayed math

 

$$*$$


<md>*</md>

Ordered Lists

 

\begin{enumerate}
  \item *
\end{enumerate}


<ol>
  <li>*</li>
</ol>

The math inside the tags is still . You are mostly learning a new wrapper, not a new language.

How We Will Work Together

  • Follow along on your own laptop; this is hands-on, not a lecture
  • Keep the workshop hub open in a second tab to refer back to the timeline
  • Ask your neighbor first; ask me second
  • Ask questions out loud when it makes sense; someone else probably has the same one
  • If something breaks, that’s normal

The goal is finished, not perfect.

Ready?