1PDFTEX(1) General Commands Manual PDFTEX(1)
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6 pdftex, pdfinitex, pdfvirtex - PDF output from TeX
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9 pdftex [options] [& format ] [ file | \ commands ]
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12 Run the pdfTeX typesetter on file, usually creating file.pdf. If the
13 file argument has no extension, ".tex" will be appended to it. Instead
14 of a filename, a set of pdfTeX commands can be given, the first of
15 which must start with a backslash. With a &format argument pdfTeX uses
16 a different set of precompiled commands, contained in format.fmt; it is
17 usually better to use the -fmt format option instead.
18 pdfTeX is a version of TeX that can create PDF files as well as DVI
20 files.
21 In DVI mode, pdfTeX can be used as a complete replacement of the TeX
23 engine.
24 The typical use of pdfTeX is with a pregenerated formats for which PDF
26 output has been enabled. The pdftex command uses the equivalent of the
27 plain TeX format, and the pdflatex command uses the equivalent of the
28 LaTeX format. To generate formats, use the -ini switch.
29 The pdfinitex and pdfvirtex commands are pdfTeX's analogues to the ini‐
31 tex and virtex commands. In this installation, they are symbolic links
32 to the pdftex executable. These symbolic links may not exist at all.
33 In PDF mode, pdfTeX can natively handle the PDF, JPG, and PNG graphics
35 formats. pdfTeX's handling of its command-line arguments is similar to
36 that of of the other TeX programs in the web2c implementation.
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39 This version of pdfTeX understands the following command line options.
40 -enc Enable the encTeX extensions. This option is only effective in
42 combination with -ini. For documentation of the encTeX exten‐
43 sions see http://www.olsak.net/enctex.html.
44 -file-line-error
46 Print error messages in the form file:line:error which is simi‐
47 lar to the way many compilers format them.
48 -no-file-line-error
50 Disable printing error messages in the file:line:error style.
51 -file-line-error-style
53 This is the old name of the -file-line-error option.
54 -fmt format
56 Use format as the name of the format to be used, instead of the
57 name by which pdfTeX was called or a %& line.
58 -halt-on-error
60 Exit with an error code when an error is encountered during pro‐
61 cessing.
62 -help Print help message and exit.
64 -ini Start in INI mode, which is used to dump formats. The INI mode
66 can be used for typesetting, but no format is preloaded, and
67 basic initializations like setting catcodes may be required.
68 -interaction mode
70 Sets the interaction mode. The mode can be either batchmode,
71 nonstopmode, scrollmode, and errorstopmode. The meaning of
72 these modes is the same as that of the corresponding \commands.
73 -ipc Send DVI or PDF output to a socket as well as the usual output
75 file. Whether this option is available is the choice of the in‐
76 staller.
77 -ipc-start
79 As -ipc, and starts the server at the other end as well.
80 Whether this option is available is the choice of the installer.
81 -jobname name
83 Use name for the job name, instead of deriving it from the name
84 of the input file.
85 -kpathsea-debug bitmask
87 Sets path searching debugging flags according to the bitmask.
88 See the Kpathsea manual for details.
89 -mktex fmt
91 Enable mktexfmt, where fmt must be either tex or tfm.
92 -mltex Enable MLTeX extensions. Only effective in combination with
94 -ini.
95 -no-mktex fmt
97 Disable mktexfmt, where fmt must be either tex or tfm.
98 -output-comment string
100 In DVI mode, use string for the DVI file comment instead of the
101 date. This option is ignored in PDF mode.
102 -output-directory directory
104 directory instead of the current directory. Look up input files
105 in directory first, the along the normal search path.
106 -output-format format
108 Set the output format mode, where format must be either pdf or
109 dvi. This also influences the set of graphics formats under‐
110 stood by pdfTeX.
111 -parse-first-line
113 If the first line of the main input file begins with %& parse it
114 to look for a dump name or a -translate-file option.
115 -no-parse-first-line
117 Disable parsing of the first line of the main input file.
118 -progname name
120 Pretend to be program name. This affects both the format used
121 and the search paths.
122 -recorder
124 Enable the filename recorder. This leaves a trace of the files
125 opened for input and output in a file with extension .fls.
126 -shell-escape
128 Enable the \write18{command} construct. The command can be any
129 shell command. This construct is normally disallowed for secu‐
130 rity reasons.
131 -no-shell-escape
133 Disable the \write18{command} construct, even if it is enabled
134 in the texmf.cnf file.
135 -src-specials
137 In DVI mode, insert source specials into the DVI file. This
138 option is ignored in PDF mode.
139 -src-specials where
141 In DVI mode, insert source specials in certain placed of the DVI
142 file. where is a comma-separated value list: cr, display, hbox,
143 math, par, parent, or vbox. This option is ignored in PDF mode.
144 -translate-file tcxname
146 Use the tcxname translation table to set the mapping of input
147 characters and re-mapping of output characters.
148 -default-translate-file tcxname
150 Like -translate-file except that a %& line can overrule this
151 setting.
152 -version
154 Print version information and exit.
155
157 See the Kpathsearch library documentation (the `Path specifications'
158 node) for precise details of how the environment variables are used.
159 The kpsewhich utility can be used to query the values of the variables.
160 One caveat: In most pdfTeX formats, you cannot use ~ in a filename you
162 give directly to pdfTeX, because ~ is an active character, and hence is
163 expanded, not taken as part of the filename. Other programs, such as
164 Metafont, do not have this problem.
165 TEXMFOUTPUT
167 Normally, pdfTeX puts its output files in the current directory.
168 If any output file cannot be opened there, it tries to open it
169 in the directory specified in the environment variable TEXMFOUT‐
170 PUT. There is no default value for that variable. For example,
171 if you say pdftex paper and the current directory is not
172 writable, if TEXMFOUTPUT has the value /tmp, pdfTeX attempts to
173 create /tmp/paper.log (and /tmp/paper.pdf, if any output is pro‐
174 duced.)
175 TEXINPUTS
177 Search path for \input and \openin files. This should probably
178 start with ``.'', so that user files are found before system
179 files. An empty path component will be replaced with the paths
180 defined in the texmf.cnf file. For example, set TEXINPUTS to
181 ".:/home/usr/tex:" to prepend the current direcory and
182 ``/home/user/tex'' to the standard search path.
183 TEXFORMATS
185 Search path for format files.
186 TEXPOOL
188 search path for pdftex internal strings.
189 TEXEDIT
191 Command template for switching to editor. The default, usually
192 vi, is set when pdfTeX is compiled.
193 TFMFONTS
195 Search path for font metric (.tfm) files.
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198 The location of the files mentioned below varies from system to system.
199 Use the kpsewhich utility to find their locations.
200 pdftex.pool
202 Text file containing pdfTeX's internal strings.
203 pdftex.map
205 Filename mapping definitions.
206 *.tfm Metric files for pdfTeX's fonts.
208 *.fmt Predigested pdfTeX format (.fmt) files.
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212 This manual page is not meant to be exhaustive. The complete documen‐
213 tation for this version of pdfTeX can be found in the info manual
214 Web2C: A TeX implementation.
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217 This version of pdfTeX implements a number of optional extensions. In
218 fact, many of these extensions conflict to a greater or lesser extent
219 with the definition of pdfTeX. When such extensions are enabled, the
220 banner printed when pdfTeX starts is changed to print pdfTeXk instead
221 of pdfTeX.
222 This version of pdfTeX fails to trap arithmetic overflow when dimen‐
224 sions are added or subtracted. Cases where this occurs are rare, but
225 when it does the generated DVI file will be invalid. Whether a gener‐
226 ated PDF file would be usable is unknown.
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229 pdfTeX is available for a large variety of machine architectures and
230 operation systems. pdfTeX is part of all major TeX distributions.
231 Information on how to get pdfeTeX and related information is available
233 at the http://tug.org TUG website. The most recent version of pdfTeX
234 is available for anonymous ftp at the http://www.pdftex.de/tex/pdftex/
235 pdfTeX development site.
236 The following pdfeTeX related mailing list is available: pdf‐
238 tex@tug.org. This is a mailman list; to subscribe send a message con‐
239 taining subscribe to pdftex-request@tug.org. More about the list can
240 be found at the http://tug.org/mailman/listinfo/pdftex mailing list
241 website.
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244 tex(1), mf(1).
245
247 The primary authors of pdfTeX are Han The Thanh, Petr Sojka, and Jiri
248 Zlatuska.
249 TeX was designed by Donald E. Knuth, who implemented it using his sys‐
251 tem for Pascal programs. It was ported to Unix at Stanford by Howard
252 Trickey, and at Cornell by Pavel Curtis. The version now offered with
253 the Unix TeX distribution is that generated by the to C system
254 (web2c), originally written by Tomas Rokicki and Tim Morgan.
255 The encTeX extensions were written by Petr Olsak.
257Web2C 7.5.4 25 March 2004 PDFTEX(1)