(Reader, this is going to be a long, ranty, rambling piece; I apologise beforehand.)

There are LaTeX packages for typesetting all kinds of things. And sometimes, there are more than one LaTeX  packages that can do (almost) the same thing — but are not compatible with each other so you often cannot load them at the same time.

If you had been given a template e.g. for typesetting your report, thesis, conference or journal manuscript, be sure to read through the instructions and example code provided in the .tex file. There may be important information re the specific packages that had already been loaded by the template or class to help you typeset certain elements (e.g. algorithms; code listings; sub-figures or sub-tables) — you should then use the commands and environments provided by these packages (i.e. the packages that the template intend you to use), and avoid loading other packages that provide similar functions. Continue reading →