What happened?
TLTR: LaTeX fragments in org fail to compile after trying to incorporate custom LaTeX macros for fragments. I’ve added my stylesheet to the org-latex-packages-alist with the snippet flag t, as indicated in the org documentation. Trying to compile a fragment results in “File “/tmp/orgtex6SSiyz.dvi” wasn’t produced. Please adjust ‘dvipng’ part of ‘org-preview-latex-process-alist’”.
Further information:
- Compiling LaTeX fragments worked before I tried to add my custom defs.
- I’ve added my package to .texlive as a style file and when using LaTeX I can include it globally via \usepackage{packagename}.
- Googling resulted in adding it in the config via
(add-to-list 'org-latex-packages-alist '("" "packagename" t))
where the snippet flag t is required for the package to be used for turning LaTeX snippets into images for non LaTeX outputs (which my org file appears to be… – setting it to nil doesn’t produce the error message, but the package is then not incorporated for the fragments, as the output misses the results of the macros)
- I’ve looked at the variable org-preview-latex-process-alist but I’m new to Emacs and wasn’t able to draw a meaningful conclusion. This means in particular that I haven’t altered it consciously.
What did you expect to happen?
I’ve expected the LaTeX fragments in org to compile and display the result of my LaTeX macros… I hope that someone can tell me how to incorporate my custom LaTeX macros so that they are also respected by LaTeX fragments in org. I would like to transition to Emacs for managing a huge LaTeX project and it would be fabulous, if the fragments were readable in my notes between the LaTeX code blocks meant for export.
Steps to reproduce
- Write a LaTeX style file ‘thisisastupidtestfile.sty’, maybe one that only contains the line
\ProvidesPackage{thisisastupidtestfile}[2022/07/15 thisisastupidtestfile]
\newcommand{\Z}{success}
put it in .textlive/style_files/
-
Check that it works with \usepackage{thisisastupidtestfile} for some random LaTeX file on your system.
-
add
(add-to-list 'org-latex-packages-alist '("" "thisisastupidtestfile" t))
(I put it after! org and after! latex) to your config, open doom, press SPC h r r, open an org file and paste $\Z = success?$.
- Hover this LaTeX fragment and hit enter, the error should occur.
System information
Loading data dump...
My testfile had a local copy of the style file in the same folder, so that it has worked anyway.
I’ve now placed it properly in /usr/share/texmf-dist/tex/latex/local/ and now I can use this package system wide when compiling with pdflatex (I’ve done that in the terminal, not emacs).
After clearing org-latex-package-alist and readding the correct package, latex fragments work (nearly) as expected!