[Tex/LaTex] Is it possible to manually put the page number when \thispagestyle{empty} is active

header-footerpage-numbering

I would like to put the command \thispagestyle{empty} after the beginning of a certain chapter and to put manually the page number at the same position, i.e., without invoking \thispagestyle{plain} or similar commands. Note that I don't know what is the number of that page, so the page number should be determined automatically.
Is it possible?

For example in the following document I would like to manually put the page number 2 (of course 2 should be determined automatically) at the bottom of page 2.

\documentclass{report}

\begin{document}
\chapter{1}
\chapter{2}
\thispagestyle{empty}

\end{document}

Best Answer

Solution 0: Build in

As David said, \thispagestyle{plain} is the right command for this purpose (as long as you don’t say why it is impossible to use it in your case). Here’s the magic code ;-)

\documentclass{report}

\begin{document}
\chapter{1}
\chapter{2}
\thispagestyle{plain}    
\end{document}

The plain style is the default for chapter opening pages anyway …

But to take a sledgehammer to crack a nut – or to shoot sparrows with cannons, as we say in Germany – here are two other ways:

Solution 1.1: Use tikz …

… to place a node on an absolute position on the page. The page is access by a named node current page.xx, where xx can be north, north east etc. for instance. Then a normal coordinate is added to shift the node to the correct position. The node is pinned to the position with its lower left (sour east) corner and has no margin between the (invisible) border and the content. As said in my comment the current page number is stored in \thepage. For more information please read the very good TikZ manual. To get the correct position the code must be compiled (at least) twice.

Here’s the code:

\documentclass{report}

\usepackage{tikz}
    \usetikzlibrary{calc}

\newcommand{\onlypnum}{%
    \thispagestyle{empty}%
    \begin{tikzpicture}[remember picture, overlay]
        \node at ($(current page.south east)+(-20mm,10mm)$)
        [
            anchor=south east,
            inner sep=0pt,
        ]
        {%
            \thepage
        };
    \end{tikzpicture}%
    \ignorespaces
}

\begin{document}
\chapter{1}
\chapter{2}
\onlypnum
\end{document}

In this version the number is placed 20mm from the right and 10mm from the bottom margin. Pleas figure out the correct values yourself (you may use \onlypnum on a page with a regular number an try to overlay both).

Solution 1.2: Use tikz …

… and the tikzpagenodes package. The latter package provides more nodes and makes the manual calculation/determination of the footer position obsolete. Here’s the code:

\documentclass{report}

\usepackage{tikz}
    \usetikzlibrary{calc}

\usepackage{tikzpagenodes}

\newcommand{\onlypnum}{%
    \thispagestyle{empty}%
    \begin{tikzpicture}[remember picture, overlay]
        \node at (current page footer area.south) [
            anchor=base,
        ] {
            \thepage
        };
    \end{tikzpicture}%
    \ignorespaces
}

\begin{document}
\chapter{1}
\chapter{2}
\onlypnum
\end{document}

Solution 2: New page style

To generate a new style I use scrlayer-scrpage, which is part of the KOMA-Script bundle. Another common package for this fast is fancyhdr. I define a new style onlypnum (actually it’s a pair of styles) that only generates the page number in the center of the foot (= \cfoot). The style can be used as usual with \(this)pagestyle. Here’s the code:

\documentclass{report}

\usepackage{scrlayer-scrpage}

\newpairofpagestyles{onlypnum}{
    \cfoot{\upshape\thepage}
}

\begin{document}
\chapter{1}
\chapter{2}
\thispagestyle{onlypnum} 
\end{document}

You may change \cfoot to suit you needs. See the KOMA-Script manual (English: scrguien.pdf, German: scrguide) for which positions are possible and further information.

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