ShareLaTeX

ShareLaTeX
Overleaf, Microsoft · CC BY-SA 4.0 · source
Name	ShareLaTeX
Developer	Collaborators including Joseph Wright, James Parnell, Kate Nolan
Released	2012
Latest release	2016 (merged)
Programming language	Node.js, CoffeeScript, MongoDB, LaTeX
Operating system	Cross-platform
Genre	Web-based LaTeX editor
License	GNU Affero General Public License (earlier), commercial offerings (later)

ShareLaTeX was a web-based LaTeX editor and collaborative platform that provided cloud-hosted document preparation and real-time collaboration for authors of technical and scientific documents. Founded in 2012, it competed and later merged with comparable services to offer an integrated online LaTeX environment used by researchers, students, and publishers. The project influenced workflows across academic institutions and open-source communities by coupling browser-based editing with server-side TeX compilation.

History

ShareLaTeX was created amid a surge of browser-based productivity tools following trends set by Google Docs, GitHub, Dropbox, OpenOffice, and Microsoft Office 365. The founders and early contributors built on technologies popularized by projects such as Node.js, MongoDB, and the LaTeX Project community, while interacting with academic partners including University of Cambridge, Imperial College London, University of Oxford, Harvard University, and Stanford University. Early publicity compared ShareLaTeX to Overleaf, Authorea, Papeeria, CoCalc, and SharePoint for collaborative writing. In 2017 the company formalized a merger with Overleaf, following industry consolidation similar to mergers involving Mendeley and Elsevier. The combined platform inherited user bases from institutions such as MIT, Caltech, Princeton University, ETH Zurich, and University of Tokyo and integrated corporate partnerships with publishers like Springer Nature and IEEE.

Features

ShareLaTeX offered features that paralleled desktop and cloud tools developed by TeX Live, MiKTeX, and editors inspired by Emacs, Vim, Sublime Text, Atom (text editor). Key capabilities included real-time multiuser editing reminiscent of Google Wave, synchronous cursor awareness like Etherpad, live PDF preview similar to PDF.js integrations used by Mozilla, project templates comparable to repositories on GitHub, and Git-backed project versioning analogous to GitLab workflows. It supported bibliography management interoperable with BibTeX, JabRef, Zotero, EndNote, and citation styles common to Nature (journal), Science (journal), and American Physical Society. Advanced features included project sharing with granular permissions, track changes comparable to Microsoft Word revisions, and compilation options aligned with XeTeX and pdfTeX used in professional publishing.

Technology and Architecture

The platform employed a stack built around Node.js and databases such as MongoDB for real-time document state, drawing architectural patterns from projects like Meteor (software) and Socket.IO for synchronization. The editor UI leveraged browser technologies championed by HTML5, WebSocket protocols originating with work at IETF, and code-editing components inspired by CodeMirror and ACE (editor). Server-side TeX compilation relied on distributions like TeX Live and MiKTeX running in containerized or sandboxed environments similar to approaches used by Docker and virtualization solutions from VMware and Kubernetes orchestration patterns. Security and isolation models referenced best practices from OpenSSL and sandboxing techniques used in Chrome (web browser).

User Interface and Collaboration

The user interface emphasized in-browser editing with split-pane layouts modeled after editors used in Visual Studio Code and integrated preview flows seen in Jupyter Notebook environments. Collaboration features included simultaneous cursors and chat inspired by interaction design from Slack (software), inline comments comparable to Gmail thread annotations, and role-based access reminiscent of Google Drive sharing. Integration with citation managers such as Zotero and Mendeley and export pipelines for submission to journals like Elsevier and Wiley simplified academic workflows. Educational deployments mirrored learning-management integrations used by Canvas (learning management system) and Moodle at universities including University College London and University of Melbourne.

Licensing and Business Model

Initially distributed under the GNU Affero General Public License in line with other open-source projects such as GNU Emacs and Vim, ShareLaTeX later adopted dual models combining open-source server code with hosted commercial services akin to business strategies used by GitHub and Atlassian. Paid tiers provided private projects, institutional subscriptions, and premium support negotiated with organizations like Elsevier and Springer Nature. The company pursued partnerships and enterprise contracts similar to deals struck by Dropbox Business and Box (company), while maintaining community editions for self-hosting by research groups at institutions such as University of Cambridge and ETH Zurich.

Reception and Impact

ShareLaTeX received positive attention from academic authors, open-source advocates, and technology press alongside competitors such as Overleaf, Authorea, and Papeeria. Reviews in outlets referencing workflows for arXiv submissions and conference proceedings for events like NeurIPS, ICML, SIGGRAPH, and ACL (conference) highlighted time-to-collaboration benefits. Its influence extended into publishing pipelines at IEEE, ACM, and journal editorial processes at Nature Communications and PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences), while education initiatives at UC Berkeley and University of Toronto adopted the service for coursework and thesis preparation.

Migration and Integration with Overleaf

Following consolidation trends exemplified by mergers such as Elsevier acquisitions and platform integrations like GitHub with Microsoft, ShareLaTeX merged with Overleaf to create a unified platform offering combined feature sets. Migration tooling and import paths echoed data-transfer systems used by Dropbox and Google Takeout, while integration with version-control paradigms matched Git workflows practiced at GitHub and GitLab. Institutions and users from Harvard University, Yale University, National University of Singapore, and University of Oxford migrated projects, templates, and user settings into the merged service, enabling continuity for conference submissions to venues like IEEE Xplore and repositories such as arXiv.

Category:Collaborative software Category:LaTeX editors Category:Web applications