Overleaf

Overleaf is a world-class LaTeX editor that is often used for collaborative writing, editing, and publishing scientific documents and papers; it provides users with precise control over producing documents that require highly-controlled typesetting, which is especially useful for extremely complex mathematics, tables, and technical content. Overleaf also facilitates footnotes, cross-referencing and bibliography management, as well as producing complicated indexes, glossaries, and tables of contents; all of this functionality is critical to be successful in publishing papers.

Overleaf can be used by any department at Columbia, but it is ideal for those in extremely technical fields, such as Computer Science, Physics, Economics, Electrical Engineering, Genetics, and Mathematics.

Overleaf Professional offers several perks that are not available with a free Overleaf account, including:

• unlimited collaboration ("sharing") with colleagues
• version tracking history
• ability to edit offline

How to create your free Overleaf Professional account

1. Visit https://www.overleaf.com/edu/columbia
2. Select Log in through your institution
3. Log in with your Columbia University UNI and password

How to link your existing Overleaf account with Columbia's free Overleaf Professional account

• If you already have an Overleaf account that is associated with your @columbia.edu address, navigate to https://www.overleaf.com/edu/columbia and click Link Accounts.
• If your Overleaf account is associated with another email address, you should log into Overleaf, navigate to your Account Settings via the drop-down in the top right-hand corner, and then add your @columbia.edu address and set it as your Primary email.
• If you receive an error that reads "The email/institution account you tried to add is already registered in Overleaf", this means that you have a second Overleaf account registered under your [email protected] email address (this could be because you have a vanity account like [email protected]; it could also be a legacy account from ShareLaTeX or WriteLaTeX, which are now owned by Overleaf). To consolidate your accounts:
  • Request a password-reset link for your [email protected] using this form: https://www.overleaf.com/user/password/reset. This will provide an Overleaf-specific password instead of your UNI password (only temporary).
  • Log in to your [email protected] Overleaf account with your new password and review the project contents. Transfer or download any content that you want to maintain. If this account is a collaborator on a shared project, then ask the project owner to be re-invited (after Step 4).
  • From the Account Settings page, delete your [email protected] Overleaf account ("Delete your account" at the bottom of the page). Alternatively you can remove the [email protected] email from the account (click the trashcan next to it) and add a different [email protected] email. (More info on deleting accounts.)
  • Now log in to your most recent Overleaf account. If this is not a [email protected] account, then make sure you go to Account Settings and add your [email protected] account as a secondary email address to ensure that you receive the benefit of Columbia's free Overleaf Professional license. (More info on managing Overleaf emails.)
  • If you still have issues, please contact Overleaf support via https://www.overleaf.com/contact.