DIY: Business cards in LaTeX

Business card can be handy in many cases, and it's not a big deal to create it at home. Let me show one of the methods.

Prerequisites

We need to have:
  • matte presentation paper (weight 44 lb/165 g/m2 in my case);
  • razor paper trimmer (I've used X-ACTO 12" Personal Paper Trimmer, but can't recommend it - it has a habit to stuck in the middle of the trimming process);
  • printer (don't know about laser printers, but ink one works fine for me);
  • LaTeX software.
The last point can be challenging, because LaTeX is not so smooth and user friendly as it can be. My basic recommendations:

  • install Perl (it's required by auto-pst-pdf package);
  • update/install all the required LaTeX packages (e.g., some Linux distributions provide incredible old LaTeX packages);
  • use "-shell-escape" command line option for pdflatex command;
  • if nothing helps, don't use "auto-pst-pdf", but build DVI/PS file, and convert it to PDF.

Single business card

The code (based on LaTeX QR Based Business Card):

\documentclass[11pt,a4paper]{memoir}

\setstocksize{55mm}{85mm} % UK Stock size
\setpagecc{55mm}{85mm}{*}
\settypeblocksize{45mm}{75mm}{*}
\setulmargins{5mm}{*}{*}
\setlrmargins{5mm}{*}{*}


\setheadfoot{0.1pt}{0.1pt}
\setheaderspaces{1pt}{*}{*}

\checkandfixthelayout[fixed]

\pagestyle{empty}

\usepackage{pstricks}
\usepackage{auto-pst-pdf,pst-barcode}

\begin{document}
    %\pagecolor[cmyk]{.22,.36,.51,.08}%
    \begin{Spacing}{0.75}%
    \noindent
    \textbf{Alexander~Slesarev}\\
    \rule{74mm}{1mm}\\
    \begin{minipage}[t]{30mm}
        \vspace{-1mm}%
        \begin{pspicture}(30mm,30mm)
            % The MECARD format is used to exchange contact information. More information at:
            % http://www.nttdocomo.co.jp/english/service/imode/make/content/barcode/function/application/addressbook/index.html
            \psbarcode{MECARD:N:Slesarev,Alexander;TEL:+16047165085;EMAIL:alex.slesarev@gmail.com;URL:http://nuald.blogspot.com;;}{eclevel=L width=1.15 height=1.15}{qrcode}
        \end{pspicture}
    \end{minipage}
    \hspace{1mm}
    \begin{minipage}[t]{42mm}
        \vspace{-1mm}%
        \begin{flushleft}
        {\scriptsize
            \begin{Spacing}{1}%
            \textbf{IT Specialist}\\
            \hspace{5mm}Software Development\\
            \hspace{5mm}Security Researcher\\
            \hspace{5mm}High Load Systems\vspace{9mm}\\
            \end{Spacing}
        }
        {\tiny
            \textbf{email:} alex.slesarev@gmail.com\\
            \textbf{phone:} 604-716-5085\\
            \textbf{web:} http://nuald.blogspot.com/\\
            \vspace*{2mm}
        }
        \end{flushleft}
    \end{minipage}
    \rule{74mm}{1mm}
    \end{Spacing}
\end{document}

After the build you'll got something like this:


I would like to notice that it can looks larger on the monitor comparing with the printing size due to different DPIs.

Multiply business card up to fill a page

Use the generated PDF to fill the boxes in the following LaTeX file (based on Tom Schneider template):

\documentclass{article}
\newcommand{\verticalcards}{5}
\textwidth 22.00cm % 21.59cm
\textheight 27.94cm
\topmargin -1.75in % was -1.0

\headheight 0in
\headsep 0in
\oddsidemargin -0.5in % ok fits A4 paper

\usepackage{pstricks} % allows using PSTricks!!  Remove if you don't have it.
\usepackage{pst-node} % nodes in pst

\usepackage{graphics}

\pagestyle{empty} % removes page numbers
\begin{document}
\noindent
\setlength{\unitlength}{1in}
\begin{picture}(8.5,11)(0.0,0.3937) % revised for 5 vertical per page
  \thicklines
  \multiput(0,0)(3.54,0.0){2}{ % horizontal (x) motion
     \multiput(0,0)(0.0,2.04){\verticalcards}{ % vertical (y) motion
        \framebox(3.5,2){ % x,y size of box, inches
           \shortstack[l]{
           \includegraphics*{visitcard.pdf}
           } % end shortstack
        } % end makebox
     } % end multiput
  } % end multiput
\end{picture}
\end{document}

Please notice includegraphics command. You can use not only a PDF file, but any appropriate image.
The result will looks like:


That's all! Print it, trim and you've got desired pieces of paper.

P.S. If you have some questions about setting up the LaTeX ask in comments, just include the information about your OS and LaTeX version.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Web application framework comparison by memory consumption

Memory consumption is slightly specific to my area of software development now, but I did some research recently and maybe these results can be useful for others. Of course, I know that precious comparison is very difficult to carry out, but actually I needed only overall picture. And let me admit that results are pretty interesting and even frustrated (at least for me). As a basis I took so-starving project, and measured initial RSS (Resident Set Size) of the each process (local development webservers). Platform: x86_64 Linux (latest Ubuntu with all updates). As a reference, here is the RSS of the interpreters in interactive console mode: Interpreter Version RSS (kB) stackless python 2.6.4 3916 ruby (via irb) 1.8.7 4664 python 2.7.1 5624 php 5.3.5 6924 v8 (via node.js shell) 2.5.9.9 8796 One more reference - the most simplest WSGI app ( example  in the Python documentation). It's RSS: 7336 Kb , so I assume it's almost impossible to consume l
Read more

Trac Ticket Workflow

Trac is the wiki and issue tracking system that is the most used for my software development projects. Let me share few hints about its ticket workflow, especially about the statuses, the roles of the participants, and let me give an example of the workflow config. But if you are interested in other things like Trac plugins, source browser, customizing, etc, let me know. All the information given below regards the workflow described at the end of the article. The original Trac workflow is missed vital features like the support for ticket verifying, or the required ticket statuses range, so I do not use it in my projects. The description of the main statuses: new - the ticket has been created; in-progress - the developer has began to work with the ticket; fixed - the ticket is fixed (the problem issued in the ticket is solved); verified - the ticket is verified (tester or PM has verified that the ticket is fixed correctly); closed - the ticket is closed (it's not
Read more

Shellcode detection using libemu

Shellcode can be seen as a list of instructions that has been developed in a manner that allows it to be injected in an application during runtime. Each security researcher face the shellcodes during their work, and in this article I'll show how to detect shellcodes using Python (via libemu Python binding). Few words about libemu : libemu is a small library written in C offering basic x86 emulation and shellcode detection using GetPC heuristics. Intended use is within network intrusion/prevention detections and honeypots. The information on the site is not actual in some places, so I'll give direct and clear instruction how to get and install libemu. Clone the git repository: $ git clone git://git.carnivore.it/libemu.git Firstly, configure, make and install libemu itself (without binding): $ autoreconf -v -i $ ./configure --prefix=/opt/libemu $ make $ sudo make install If you set up prefix as shown above, you have to add the library path to /etc/ld.so.conf file
Read more