JSS article throw error upon knitting

[cimentadaj]

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---

I'm trying to knit a fresh template of JSS and I get a LaTeX error. I remember knitting this template a few months ago and everything was fine. Here's the template:

---
documentclass: jss
author:
  - name: FirstName LastName
    affiliation: University/Company
    # use this syntax to add text on several lines
    address: |
      | First line
      | Second line
    email: \email{name@company.com}
    url: http://rstudio.com
  - name: Second Author
    affiliation: 'Affiliation \AND'
    # To add another line, use \AND at the end of the previous one as above
  - name: Third Author
    address: |
      | Department of Statistics and Mathematics,
      | Faculty of Biosciences,
      | Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
    affiliation: |
      | Universitat Autònoma 
      | de Barcelona
    # use a different affiliation in adress field (differently formated here)
    affiliation2: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
title:
  formatted: "A Capitalized Title: Something about a Package \\pkg{foo}"
  # If you use tex in the formatted title, also supply version without
  plain:     "A Capitalized Title: Something about a Package foo"
  # For running headers, if needed
  short:     "\\pkg{foo}: A Capitalized Title"
abstract: >
  The abstract of the article.
keywords:
  # at least one keyword must be supplied
  formatted: [keywords, not capitalized, "\\proglang{Java}"]
  plain:     [keywords, not capitalized, Java]
preamble: >
  \usepackage{amsmath}
output: rticles::jss_article
---

```{r, setup, include=FALSE}
options(tinytex.verbose = TRUE)
options(prompt = 'R> ', continue = '+ ')```

# Introduction

This template demonstrates some of the basic LaTeX that you need to know to create a JSS article.

## Code formatting

In general, don't use Markdown, but use the more precise LaTeX commands instead:

* \proglang{Java}
* \pkg{plyr}

One exception is inline code, which can be written inside a pair of backticks (i.e., using the Markdown syntax).

If you want to use LaTeX commands in headers, you need to provide a `short-title` attribute. You can also provide a custom identifier if necessary. See the header of Section \ref{r-code} for example.

# \proglang{R} code {short-title="R code" #r-code}

Can be inserted in regular R markdown blocks.

```{r}
x <- 1:10
x```

## Features specific to \pkg{rticles} {short-title="Features specific to rticles"}

* Adding short titles to section headers is a feature specific to \pkg{rticles} (implemented via a Pandoc Lua filter). This feature is currently not supported by Pandoc and we will update this template if [it is officially supported in the future](https://github.com/jgm/pandoc/issues/4409).
* Using the `\AND` syntax in the `author` field to add authors on a new line. This is a specific to the `rticles::jss_article` format.

I saved that as jss.Rmd and here's the output:

processing file: jss.Rmd
  |..............                                                        |  20%
  ordinary text without R code

  |............................                                          |  40%
label: setup (with options) 
List of 1
 $ include: logi FALSE

  |..........................................                            |  60%
  ordinary text without R code

  |........................................................              |  80%
label: unnamed-chunk-1
  |......................................................................| 100%
  ordinary text without R code


/usr/bin/pandoc +RTS -K512m -RTS jss.utf8.md --to latex --from markdown+autolink_bare_uris+tex_math_single_backslash --output jss.tex --lua-filter /usr/local/lib/R/site-library/rmarkdown/rmarkdown/lua/pagebreak.lua --lua-filter /usr/local/lib/R/site-library/rmarkdown/rmarkdown/lua/latex-div.lua --self-contained --template /home/jorge/R/x86_64-pc-linux-gnu-library/4.0/rticles/rmarkdown/templates/jss/resources/template.tex --highlight-style tango --pdf-engine pdflatex --natbib --lua-filter /home/jorge/R/x86_64-pc-linux-gnu-library/4.0/rticles/rmarkdown/lua/short-title.lua 
output file: jss.knit.md

This is pdfTeX, Version 3.14159265-2.6-1.40.21 (TeX Live 2020) (preloaded format=pdflatex)
 restricted \write18 enabled.
entering extended mode
I was unable to find any missing LaTeX packages from the error log jss.log.
! Undefined control sequence.
\hyper@linkurl ...tionraw >>}\relax \Hy@colorlink 
                                                  \@urlcolor #1\Hy@xspace@en...
l.56 \begin{document}

Error: LaTeX failed to compile jss.tex. See https://yihui.org/tinytex/r/#debugging for debugging tips. See jss.log for more info.
Execution halted

I saw that this error could be related to the email field but this is the default template from RStudio for JSS, so I don't understand where this is happening. Just in case, I removed the email field and searched for any hyperlinks and can't find where this error is coming from.

Here's the session info for rticles:

R version 4.0.2 (2020-06-22)
Platform: x86_64-pc-linux-gnu (64-bit)
Running under: Ubuntu 20.04.1 LTS, RStudio 1.3.1093

Locale:
  LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8       LC_NUMERIC=C               LC_TIME=de_DE.UTF-8        LC_COLLATE=en_US.UTF-8    
  LC_MONETARY=de_DE.UTF-8    LC_MESSAGES=en_US.UTF-8    LC_PAPER=de_DE.UTF-8       LC_NAME=C                 
  LC_ADDRESS=C               LC_TELEPHONE=C             LC_MEASUREMENT=de_DE.UTF-8 LC_IDENTIFICATION=C       

Package version:
  base64enc_0.1.3 digest_0.6.25   evaluate_0.14   glue_1.4.2      graphics_4.0.2  grDevices_4.0.2 highr_0.8       htmltools_0.5.0
  jsonlite_1.7.1  knitr_1.30      magrittr_1.5    markdown_1.1    methods_4.0.2   mime_0.9        rlang_0.4.7     rmarkdown_2.4  
  rticles_0.16    stats_4.0.2     stringi_1.5.3   stringr_1.4.0   tinytex_0.26    tools_4.0.2     utils_4.0.2     xfun_0.18      
  yaml_2.2.1   

I have the latest tinytex installation as well. I also tried running other articles (JOSS) and everything works fine.

[cderv]

I can reproduce this locally, but it is not happening on travis. I wonder why. 🤔
I am looking into this

[cderv]

Ok I was able to find out that this works with an old version of texlive but does not work with the last texlive version installed with tinytex 📦
I believe it works on CI because TinyTeX may be cached there...

[cimentadaj]

I see, let me try it out with a previous texlive version. Which version did you try?

[cderv]

I am currently on tlmgr revision 56458 (2020-09-28 00:20:18 +0200)

[cimentadaj]

That's odd, I have the same revision/time number and I can't make this work:

~$: tlmgr --version
tlmgr revision 56458 (2020-09-28 00:20:18 +0200)
tlmgr using installation: /home/jorge/.TinyTeX
TeX Live (https://tug.org/texlive) version 2020

[cderv]

Oh yeah sorry. I can't make this work with this one.
But when I tried on another environment, it worked and after updating TinyTeX it did not work. Unfortunatly I can't find the version I had... :(

[cderv]

Ok I took advantage of TinyTeX new versioned released

• It works after install version of september: tinytex::install_tinytex(version = "2020.09.19")
• It does not work after installing last version tinytex::install_tinytex(version = "2020.10")

Not yet sure what happens between both...

[cimentadaj]

I can reproduce this. Version 2020.09.19 works as well.

[noeliarico]

Hi! (specially to @cderv as is the second time I run into him today haha)

I'm getting the same error in RStudio Cloud and it does not go anywhere after I do tinytex::install_tinytex(version = "2020.09.19"), any ideas?

[cderv]

@noeliarico I don't know why this is difference in RStudio Cloud. I just tested and indeed 2020.09.19 is not working on RStudio cloud. 🤷‍♂️

This is an odd issue, I am a bit short now - I leave @yihui throw some ideas for this.

Anyway, if I come up with something I'll post here.

[stefvanbuuren]

For what it's worth. I had a working system, issued tinytex::tlmgr(), and then I got the error reported above on the same .tex file that previously worked. Used tinytex 0.25, rticles 0.15. When I changed to output: pdf_document the error disappeared (though of course the nice JSS formatting was gone).

[cderv]

Thanks for sharing.

When I changed to output: pdf_document the error disappeared (though of course the nice JSS formatting was gone).

Regarding this, yes this is something happening (like a conflict) with the jss.cls and its template with last tlmgr version.

[stefvanbuuren]

Saw a warning on line 466 of jss.cls. Do not remember exactly, but was something about double declaration of a package. Perhaps that could shine a light.

[jdblischak]

Just to add another data point, I was also able to fix the issue by following the advice from @cderv to install a previous release of TinyTeX.

Error message:

! Undefined control sequence.
\hyper@linkurl ...tionraw >>}\relax \Hy@colorlink 
                                                  \@urlcolor #1\Hy@xspace@en...
l.69 \begin{document}

Initial texlive version:

> tinytex::tlmgr("--version")
tlmgr --version
tlmgr revision 56566 (2020-10-06 05:40:54 +0200)
tlmgr using installation: C:/Users/john/AppData/Roaming/TinyTeX
TeX Live (https://tug.org/texlive) version 2020

Solution:

tinytex::reinstall_tinytex(version = "2020.09.19")

Note that during the reinstallation, it ran tlmgr update --self. So the final version ended up being the same:

> tinytex::tlmgr("--version")
tlmgr --version
tlmgr revision 56566 (2020-10-06 05:40:54 +0200)
tlmgr using installation: C:/Users/john/AppData/Roaming/TinyTeX
TeX Live (https://tug.org/texlive) version 2020

Thus I have to admit it's unclear to me how this fixed the problem, but it did.

System information:

> xfun::session_info(c("rticles", "tinytex"))
R version 4.0.2 (2020-06-22)
Platform: x86_64-w64-mingw32/x64 (64-bit)
Running under: Windows 10 x64 (build 19041), RStudio 1.3.1056

Locale:
  LC_COLLATE=English_United States.1252  LC_CTYPE=English_United States.1252   
  LC_MONETARY=English_United States.1252 LC_NUMERIC=C                          
  LC_TIME=English_United States.1252    

Package version:
  base64enc_0.1.3 digest_0.6.25   evaluate_0.14   glue_1.4.1      graphics_4.0.2  grDevices_4.0.2
  highr_0.8       htmltools_0.5.0 jsonlite_1.7.0  knitr_1.30      magrittr_1.5    markdown_1.1   
  methods_4.0.2   mime_0.9        rlang_0.4.7     rmarkdown_2.3   rticles_0.16    stats_4.0.2    
  stringi_1.4.6   stringr_1.4.0   tinytex_0.26    tools_4.0.2     utils_4.0.2     xfun_0.15      
  yaml_2.2.1 

[yihui]

I guess a recent update of a certain LaTeX package broke it (but I don't know which). The breakage shouldn't be due to tlmgr itself, which is why tlmgr update --self doesn't matter.

To figure out which package(s) broke it, we need to compare the output of

tinytex::tlmgr('info --list --only-installed --data name,cat-version')

between TinyTeX 2020.09.19 and 2020.10. You can paste the output to https://www.diffchecker.com and find the diffs.

After we identify the possible culprit, we may need to contact the author of the package.

Another possible way to go is to check if jss.cls in rticles is the latest version (https://www.jstatsoft.org/pages/view/style). If not, we need to test against the latest version. If it doesn't work, we'll have to either contact the author of the LaTeX package that broke jss.cls, or contact JSS and see if they could with the latest version of LaTeX packages on CTAN.

I don't have time for these tasks myself, so will appreciate it if someone could help out. Thanks!

[yihui]

To further pin down the offending LaTeX package, you may try to install TinyTeX built between 2020.09.19 and 2020.10.04 The daily builds can be found at https://ci.appveyor.com/project/yihui/tinytex/history. Go to the Artifacts tab and download TinyTeX-1.zip, e.g., https://ci.appveyor.com/project/yihui/tinytex/builds/35428252/job/0ihcbltadyvu3myt/artifacts Then pass the path of this zip file to tinytex::install_prebuilt() to install it.

You can manually bisect these daily builds until you find the day when it was broken. This may be time-consuming, though (with 15 daily builds, I think you need to bisect 3 times).

[cderv]

Thanks for the hints @yihui ! That will definitly be helpful.

Also for everyone wanted to help:

Another possible way to go is to check if jss.cls in rticles is the latest version (https://www.jstatsoft.org/pages/view/style). If not, we need to test against the latest version.

We have version 3.0 from 2015 but I tested again the last one (version 3.1 from 2020/08/03) and we get the same result. So once we find the culprit, there may be a fix to push into jss.cls

[cderv]

OK I found the culprit. Not a small one !

I followed the advice on looking at the diff of the result of

tinytex::tlmgr('info --list --only-installed --data "name,cat-version"')

There was a few packages so I decide to test by installing them one by one starting with the more obvious one: latex

• Install previous version

tinytex::install_tinytex(version = "2020.09.19")

• The JSS document compiles correctly
• Update latex

tinytex::tlmgr_update(all = FALSE, self = FALSE, "latex")

• Try recompiling : You got the error !

There has been an update of latex package on CTAN on the 01/10/2020: https://www.latex-project.org/news/2020/10/01/issue32-of-latex2e-released/
and this is the one that break things. Something has changed in the hook management, including \AtBeginDocument which is used by jss.cls

So I guess this is the jss.cls file that has an issue and an issue should be opened with JSS on this one.

If someone want to look deeper from here on what has changed, please do !

Hope it helps.

[yihui]

@cderv Awesome! Thank you! In this case, I think we need to report to JSS, because they'll have to fix it sooner or later (I'm not sure if @statibk subscribed to Github notifications).

[cderv]

Hi @cimentadaj , @jdblischak , @noeliarico , @stefvanbuuren

We fixed the issue with template by pinning down the version of the problematic package. It is not perfect but at least it will now render. You need to install the last rticles version from github.

There was another issue with the latexrelease update in #331 and the editor of Copernicus journal are working on a fix for their class. The same should be done with JSS editors.

Has one of you already email the JSS editors regarding this issue ?

[stefvanbuuren]

Just sent a note to Achim Zeileis.

[zeileis]

Thanks for the pointer! I don't get the problem with my system TeXLive (I'm on Debian testing with tlmgr revision 56372), yet, but I guess it should arrive soon enough. I didn't have the time/resources to install a separate TinyTeX version so will have to wait with debugging the issue.

Or did anyone find out already what exactly caused the problem? This isn't clear to me from the above discussion. Further pointers would be much appreciated.

P.S.: I'm using this GitHub account now for which I do get notifications.

[yihui]

@zeileis Yes, @cderv found out a fix: https://github.com/rstudio/rticles/pull/337/files I'm not sure if it's the best solution, though.

[cderv]

Or did anyone find out already what exactly caused the problem? This isn't clear to me from the above discussion. Further pointers would be much appreciated.

@zeileis We isolate the issue to this specific package latexrelease update: https://www.latex-project.org/news/2020/10/01/issue32-of-latex2e-released/
See #329 (comment)

The current workaround is to pin down the version in the template. This was also the workaround for this other issue (#331) where Copernicus Journal editor seems to work on a fix (#331 (comment))

I do not know what exactly is causing the issue with the new version but I believe this is something to do with the use of \AtBeginDocument as there were some changes with the hook management system for LaTeX in the new latexrelease version.

[zeileis]

Thank you @yihui and @cderv for the follow-up. I understood that your fix is to not use the latest version - but ideally I would want to provide a jss.cls file that cooperates with both versions of the package. And I'm not sure how to do that.

I took some time today to investigate this issue further and can confirm that it is indeed related to \AtBeginDocument, more specifically \AtBeginDocument{\maketitle}. If I this is in the jss.cls file, I get the error. However, if I put it into the article.tex file, it works as intended. So a workaround that can currently be used is to do

\documentclass[article,notitle]{jss}
\AtBeginDocument{\maketitle}
...

Note the notitle option in the \documentclass.

What I still need to find out is which part of the \maketitle definition in jss.cls is not compatible with the new hook. Probably one of the variables that I define and then want to use which are now defined at a later point.

I'll let you know if I find out more about this. Thanks again for your work/insights regarding this issue!

[zeileis]

OK, I think I have a better solution, albeit possibly still not ideal. When I replace the line from jss.cls

\AtBeginDocument{\maketitle}

with

\@ifundefined{AddToHook}{\AtBeginDocument{\maketitle}}{\AddToHook{begindocument}[maketitle]{\maketitle}}

then it appears to work for both old and new LaTeX versions.

Does anyone here know whether this is a good/reliable way of checking for the availability of \AddToHook?

[zeileis]

Just for the record: The fix posted above has now been officially released as version 3.2 of jss.cls. The updated style files are available both from https://www.jstatsoft.org/pages/view/style and in the base R sources:

wch/r-source@3d68934#diff-40d315f66f364ab42b39fbf99b30ddebea15425296b4c844827d478059fe061b

[yihui]

@zeileis That's great to know! Thanks for posting back!

@cderv Please update jss.cls in our package accordingly when you have a chance. Thanks!

[cderv]

That is great ! I'll do that !

[cderv]

jss.cls is now updated in dev version of the package.

[zeileis]

Perfect, thanks a lot for the rapid update!

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