[Tex/LaTex] Multiple copies of short page on one sheet of paper

paper-sizepdfpagesprinting

Suppose you have a short document (including a fancy header) which occupies only a small part of a DIN A4 page, like in this example:

\documentclass[a4paper, 12pt]{article}

\usepackage[top=2cm,hmargin=2.2cm]{geometry}

\usepackage{fancyhdr}
\pagestyle{fancy}
\fancyhf{}
\fancyhead[R]{\small \today}
\fancyhead[L]{\small  header}
\fancyfoot[C]{}


\begin{document}
short text  short text  short text short text  short
text  short text  short text  short text  short text  short
text  short text short text  short text  short text  short
text short text  short text  short text  short text  short
text  short text  short text  short text  short text end of the text.
\end{document}

Suppose I want to print this text 50 times. To save paper I would print it and use a photocopier to copy this text incl. fancy header several times to one sheet of paper.

Now my question is, if there is a simple LaTeX way to do this, i.e. in the above example, have as many copies of all text from fancy header to "end of the text" automatically on a DIN A4 sheet as you can fit on it?

Best Answer

I do not know an fully automatically way, but it is possible to do it manually with minimal adjustments.

First way:

Reduce the height of the page to the minimal height by replacing a4paper with pagewidth=21cm,pageheight=4cm (here 21cm is the A4 width and 4cm depends on the text content and margin requirements).

\usepackage[top=2cm,hmargin=2.2cm,paperwidth=21cm,paperheight=4cm]{geometry}

Then create a second small LaTeX document which includes the PDF of the first using the pdfpages pages and places it multiple times on one page:

\documentclass[a4paper]{article}
\usepackage{pdfpages}
\begin{document}
\includepdf[page={1,1,1,1,1,1,1},nup=1x7]{mainfile}
\end{document}

This places the first document (called mainfile.tex/.pdf here) seven times on page. Adjust both the number of 1, and the number of nup=1x to the real number which fit on one page.

Example Result:

Result

Second way:

You could create the headers using normal text instead so it can be repeated over the page. A tabular would be adequate here. Putting the main text into one multi-column cell also prevents page breaks inside the text. The the text could be repeated using a loop. Adjust the \vspaces and the repeat numbers to fit your requirements.

\documentclass[a4paper, 12pt]{article}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage[pdftex]{graphicx}
\usepackage[top=2cm,hmargin=2.2cm]{geometry}
\pagestyle{empty}

\begin{document}

\newcount\num
\loop\ifnum\num<7
\par\noindent
\begin{tabular}{@{}l@{}r@{}}
    \small \today & header \\
    \hline\noalign{\vspace{.5cm}}
    \multicolumn{2}{@{}p{\linewidth}@{}}{%
\hspace*{\parindent}% if par indent is required
 short text  short text  short text short text  short
text  short text  short text  short text  short text  short
text  short text short text  short text  short text  short
text short text  short text  short text  short text  short
text  short text  short text  short text  short text end of the text
}
\end{tabular}
\par\vspace{1cm}%
\advance\num by 1
\repeat

\end{document}

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] How to set a binding offset for multiple pages printed on one sheet

I feel a little uneasy at answering my own question. But lockstep's clue directed me to the twocolumn parameter on the documentclass.

That seems to work fairly. It subdivides the physical sheet into two logical pages. So looks a little like using multicols{2} on the whole document, but with fewer of the drawbacks.

The magic inteplay between documentclass and geometry seems to be (note the exaggerated 5cm inner margin for binding offset -- just to make it easier to see):

\documentclass[a4paper,twocolumn,landscape,10pt]{book}
\usepackage[top=2cm, bottom=2cm, inner=5cm, outer=1cm]{geometry}

This solution may be just the ticket for many documents.

However, I can see problems where I have a wrapfigure inside a miniboxpage with each scaled as a fraction of the \textwidth. It seems \textwidth is sometimes taken as the full physical width of the sheet, and sometimes as the text width of the logical page. I need to isolate cases and investigate further.

Thanks for the responses -- they've given me some hope for the future.

[Tex/LaTex] Compile two A5 pages on one A4 page

The following uses, as also suggested by DG', the pgfpages package to do the 1x2 A5 on A4 layout, but automatically duplicates the content of each A5 page at shipout time, so that you end up with two identical A5 copies on each A4 page.

It also works with multi-page documents.

\documentclass[a5paper,12pt,norsk]{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage{babel,fouriernc,parskip,booktabs,array}
\usepackage[margin=1cm,landscape]{geometry}
\usepackage{enumitem}

\usepackage{pgfpages}                                 % <— load the package
  \pgfpagesuselayout{2 on 1}[a4paper,border shrink=5mm] % <— set options

\usepackage{atbegshi}
  % duplicate the content at shipout time
  \AtBeginShipout{
    \pgfpagesshipoutlogicalpage{1}\copy\AtBeginShipoutBox
    \pgfpagesshipoutlogicalpage{2}\box\AtBeginShipoutBox
    \pgfshipoutphysicalpage
  }

\usepackage{blindtext}


\setlist{nolistsep}
\renewcommand\labelitemi{--}

\begin{document}
\thispagestyle{empty}
{\Large <<Jeg kan>> om kjemi}

\vspace{1em}
\begin{center}
\begin{tabular}{p{0.7\textwidth} |>{\centering}p{0.1\textwidth}| >{\centering}p{0.1\textwidth}}
    \toprule
    \textbf{Spørsmål} & \textbf{ja} & \textbf{nei} \tabularnewline
    \hline
    \dots some text & & \tabularnewline
    \bottomrule
\end{tabular}
\end{center}

% To demonstrate that it also works with multiple pages
\newpage

\blindtext

\end{document}

enter image description here

Remark: If your a5 pages are portrait, then the setup is:

\documentclass[a5paper]{article}
...
\usepackage[margin=1cm,portrait]{geometry}
...
\usepackage{pgfpages}
\pgfpagesuselayout{2 on 1}[a4paper,landscape,border shrink=5mm]
...