texlive-small

A Light-weight TeX Live Docker Image for LaTeX

What is texlive-small

texlive-small is a TeX Live Docker image with scheme-small installation and some common packages. It allows you to write LaTeX and generate high quality pdf files. Also, it focuses on English and traditional Chinese, so its size is much less than the TeX Live with scheme-full installation.

Installation

• Step 1. Install docker by following Docker official installation guide. Docker is cross-platform so you can run texlive-small on Mac OSX / Linux / Windows.
• Step 2. To download the image, run

docker pull weichuntsai/texlive-small:1.1.0

• Step 3. To initialize the container, run

docker run --name ${The Container Name You Want} -dt -v ${Your Directory for Tex files}:/home weichuntsai/texlive-small:1.1.0

For example,

docker run --name mylatex -dt -v /Users/jimmy_tsai/Documents:/home weichuntsai/texlive-small:1.1.0

• Step 4. To enter into the container you initialized in Step 3 (assume its name is mylatex), run

docker exec -it mylatex bash

For what commands you can use in this container, please refer to the following Usage parts.

Usage - README

To see README in the container, just run:

$ more /README-texlive-small.md

Usage - generate a pdf from a tex

The command is as below:

$ txrun ${tex_file} ${engine_type}

where tex_file is your tex, and engine_type is the LaTeX engine and it could be one of xelatex, latex, or pdflatex. Now we are going to explain which engine_type you should use. Let's assume your tex is my_input.tex, then:

• Scenario 1 - if the tex contains the command \usepackage{fontspec} (because you want to use \setmainfont{another font} to change the font), then you have to run:

$ txrun my_input.tex xelatex

• Scenario 2 - if the tex contains non-English content (for example, traditional Chinese), then you have to run:

$ txrun my_input.tex xelatex

• Scenario 3 - if the tex (without \usepackage{fontspec}) contains English content and eps figures, then you can run:

$ txrun my_input.tex xelatex

or

$ txrun my_input.tex latex

• Scenario 4 - if the tex (without \usepackage{fontspec}) contains English content and does not contain eps figures, then you can run:

$ txrun my_input.tex xelatex

or

$ txrun my_input.tex latex

or

$ txrun my_input.tex pdflatex

Note that txrun is just a convenient wrapper of (xe/pdf)latex and would remove some derived files you don't need:

• What txrun my_input.tex xelatex does is

rm my_input.aux my_input.bbl my_input.blg my_input.idx my_input.ilg my_input.ind my_input.lof my_input.log my_input.lot my_input.out my_input.toc my_input.dvi
xelatex my_input.tex
bibtex my_input.aux
xelatex my_input.tex
xelatex my_input.tex
rm my_input.aux my_input.bbl my_input.blg my_input.idx my_input.ilg my_input.ind my_input.lof my_input.log my_input.lot my_input.out my_input.toc my_input.dvi

• What txrun my_input.tex latex does is

rm my_input.aux my_input.bbl my_input.blg my_input.idx my_input.ilg my_input.ind my_input.lof my_input.log my_input.lot my_input.out my_input.toc my_input.dvi
latex my_input.tex
bibtex my_input.aux
latex my_input.tex
latex my_input.tex
dvipdf my_input.dvi
rm my_input.aux my_input.bbl my_input.blg my_input.idx my_input.ilg my_input.ind my_input.lof my_input.log my_input.lot my_input.out my_input.toc my_input.dvi

• What txrun my_input.tex pdflatex does is

rm my_input.aux my_input.bbl my_input.blg my_input.idx my_input.ilg my_input.ind my_input.lof my_input.log my_input.lot my_input.out my_input.toc my_input.dvi
pdflatex my_input.tex
bibtex my_input.aux
pdflatex my_input.tex
pdflatex my_input.tex
rm my_input.aux my_input.bbl my_input.blg my_input.idx my_input.ilg my_input.ind my_input.lof my_input.log my_input.lot my_input.out my_input.toc my_input.dvi

Font Management

I want to install new fonts

There are 2 ways to install fonts you like:

1. apt-get install ${font_package_name} to install the fonts in Ubuntu library.
2. Download the font and run addfont. For example, you can visit https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Roboto and click "Download family" button to download "Roboto" font. The downloaded file is a zip file. Unzip it and you would get an unzipped folder called "Roboto". Then in the texlive-small container, go to the directory containing "Roboto" folder and then run addfont ./Roboto.

How to check font files installed position in texlive-small container

Just run fc-list

How to show installed font names which I want to use in tex

Just run fc-list : family

Pre-installed fonts in texlive-small image (you don't need to install again)

• Roboto -> sans-serif for English
• Noto Serif TC -> serif for traditional Chinese
• Noto Sans TC -> sans-serif for traditional Chinese

Usage - English fonts

Latex has its default English font. If you wan to change it (ex: you want to change it into Roboto), please do the following: In your tex, before the line \begin{document}, add lines as below

% In your tex file
\usepackage{fontspec}
\setmainfont{Roboto} % Fill in any English font name you installed.

\begin{document}
...
\end{document}

Usage - CJK fonts (use traditional Chinese as the example)

There are 2 scenarios

Scenario 1: The CJK font supports Bold (ex: Noto Serif TC)

In your tex, before the line \begin{document}, add lines as below

% In your tex file
\usepackage{xeCJK}
\setCJKmainfont{Noto Serif TC} % Fill in any CJK font name you installed.

\begin{document}
...
\end{document}

Scenario 2: The CJK font does not support Bold & Italic (ex: AR PL UMing TW)

In your tex, before the line \begin{document}, add lines as below

% In your tex file
\usepackage[BoldFont, SlantFont]{xeCJK}
\setCJKmainfont{AR PL UMing TW} % Fill in any CJK font name you installed.

\begin{document}
...
\end{document}

Usage - TeX / LaTeX package management

Search packages by the package name

$ tlmgr search --global ${package_name}

For examle, to search the package named marginnote:

$ tlmgr search --global marginnote

Search packages by the file name

$ tlmgr search --global --file ${file_name}

For example, to search the package which contains the file marginnote.sty:

$ tlmgr search --global --file marginnote.sty

Install packages

$ tlmgr install ${package_name}

For example, to install the package marginnote:

$ tlmgr install marginnote

Remove packages

$ tlmgr remove ${package_name}

For example, to remove the package named marginnote:

$ tlmgr remove marginnote

Change package repository

$ tlmgr option repository ${repo_link}

For example:

$ tlmgr option repository http://mirror.ctan.org/systems/texlive/tlnet

When you search / install packages and find that tlmgr is pending for a long time (server error or no reponse), in this case, you could consider to change the package repository.

Check the fonts installed in this container

$ fc-list

Install packages manually (not from tlmgr install) - method 1

In fact you can just download the tds.zip of the package you want from CTAN then install it manually. For example, if you want to install marginnote:

• Step 1. In your host (not Docker container) environment, open the browser and go to CTAN
• Step 2. Search marginnote then enter into the marginnote page of CTAN
• Step 3. Download the TDS archive marginnote.tds.zip
• Step 4. Copy this marginnote.tds.zip into the Docker container. For example: we copy it from /Users/jimmy_tsai/Downloads into /root of the container:

docker cp /Users/jimmy_tsai/Downloads/marginnote.tds.zip ${container_id}:/root

• Step 5. In the Docker container, go to /root and unzip marginnote.tds.zip to $TEXMFHOME. For example:

$ cd /root
$ unzip marginnote.tds.zip -d $TEXMFHOME

Basiclly no need to update tlmgr index.

Install packages manually (not from tlmgr install) - method 2

In fact you can just download the tds.zip of the package you want from CTAN then install it manually. For example, if you want to install marginnote:

• Step 1. In your host (not Docker container) environment, open the browser and go to CTAN
• Step 2. Search marginnote then enter into the marginnote page of CTAN
• Step 3. Download the TDS archive marginnote.tds.zip
• Step 4. Copy this marginnote.tds.zip into the Docker container. For example: we copy it from /Users/jimmy_tsai/Downloads into /root of the container:

docker cp /Users/jimmy_tsai/Downloads/marginnote.tds.zip ${container_id}:/root

• Step 5. In the Docker container, go to /root and unzip marginnote.tds.zip to /usr/local/texlive/texmf-local/. For example:

$ cd /root
$ unzip marginnote.tds.zip -d /usr/local/texlive/texmf-local/

• Step 6. Update tlmgr index

$ mktexlsr /usr/local/texlive/texmf-local

A general guide for writing journals / papers

The key point is that you have to use the cls (assume it is some_journal.cls) of the journal in your tex by the line \documentclass{some_journal}.

Journals usually provide a template package (usually it is a zip) containing a cls (which defines the journal style) and some template tex files.

For different journals, there are usually 2 scenarios for the template package:

• Scenario 1. The package provides a cls and a template tex. Usually the template tex already used the cls in \documentclass and what you have to do is to modify the text content of the template tex.
• Scenario 2. The package provides a tds.zip and a template tex. First, you have to unzip tds.zip to TeX Live directory, and then you can modify the text content of the template tex.

Here we use IEEE for Scenario 1 and Physical Review Journals for Scenario 2 as demonstration examples.

Example 1. IEEE Journals

• Step 1. Google the keywords "IEEE latex template", and you probably find some link like this link
• Step 2. Download the template package (assume it is a zip) from the page you found in Step 1.
• Step 3. Unzip the template package, it contains a cls (assume it is IEEEtran.cls) and a template tex.
• Step 4. In the template tex, it usually already used IEEEtran.cls by the line \documentclass[conference]{IEEEtran}, so what you have to do is to modify the text content of the template tex.
• Step 5. After edited the template tex (assume it is conference_041818.tex), run

txrun conference_041818.tex latex

Example 2. Physical Review Journals

• Step 1. Google the keywords "physical review journal latex template", and you probably find some link like this link
• Step 2. Download the template package (assume it is a zip) from the page you found in Step 1.
• Step 3. Unzip the template package, it contains a tds.zip (assume it is revtex4-1-tds.zip) and a README.
• Step 4. Following the README to unzip the revtex4-1-tds.zip to TeX Live directory and update TeX Live package index. Usually the commands are like this

$ unzip revtex4-1-tds.zip -d /usr/local/texlive/texmf-local/
$ mktexlsr /usr/local/texlive/texmf-local

• Step 5. Find the template tex in the unzipped tds.zip and modify the text content in it. For exmaple, it is usually in /usr/local/texlive/texmf-local/doc/latex/revtex/sample/aps and /usr/local/texlive/texmf-local/doc/latex/revtex/sample/aip.
• Step 6. After edited the template tex (assume it is apssamp.tex), run

txrun apssamp.tex latex

Finally I list 2 reminds here:

• Remind 1. You can try xelatex or pdflatex for the 2nd argument (LaTeX engine) of txrun and see if the result is OK. For different journals, different LaTeX engines could cause a little different visual effetcs.
• Remind 2. If you have eps figures in your tex, please do NOT use pdflatex for the LaTeX engine.