How to download Optica's LaTeX template in Overleaf

Fig. 1. Overleaf's user interface for the Optica journal template. The menu button is at the upper left corner. 

Newsletter: Volume 1, Issue 1 (Feb 2023) 

Topic: Research

Contents:

• Optica's directions for downloading LaTeX files
• Overleaf's menu button for downloading source files
• My rendered LaTeX code using pdflatex in TeXworks

I was using the free Overleaf account and one of its deal-breaking restrictions is the one-minute compile time. I can increase the compile time to 4 min if I get the Personal (USD 129), Standard (USD 199), and or Professional (  USD 399) Overleaf plan.  If your project has too many figures and style files, Overleaf would need more time to compile it, which can exceed the 1 minute mark. 

One way to go around these restrictions is to compile your LaTeX code in your computer using the journal style files from Overleaf. Optica, for example, states that this manual compilation is possible:

• Choose the journal-specific "Access on Overleaf" link above and open Overleaf. 
• Click on the "Open As Template" button. 
• In the template, at the left there is a dropdown arrow next to "Download as Zip". 
• Choose the "For Submission (with .bbl)" option and download the template package.

But it looks like this description is outdated, because Overleaf already changed its user interface. I cannot see the dropdown arrow or the phrase "Download as Zip." What shall I do? Shall I copy all these style sheets and templates manually and save them in my computer's folder? This can be done in principle, but copying and saving files is hard work. There should be a simpler way.

I looked around the Overleaf page. In the upper left corner there is a hamburger icon labeled as "Menu" (Fig. 1). I clicked on the menu and voila! A left sidebar with many options. The topmost part of the left sidebar is "Download" which has two options: "Source" and "pdf" (Fig. 2). I clicked "Source" and a zip file was downloaded to my computer. I extracted the zip file and I was able to get all the files that I saw in Overleaf. I ran the template file, which paused several times to request my permission to download files that it has to fetch at some distant server. After all the files were fetched  I was able to render the corresponding pdf of the LaTeX template code using pdflatex in TeXworks (Fig. 3). 

Fig. 2. After clicking the menu at the upper left corner, a side bar appears that allows you to download the LaTeX source files. 

 

 

Fig. 3. Optica journal's template redered using pdflatex in TeXworks.

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