[Tex/LaTex] Replace \input{fileX} by the content of fileX automatically

automationinput

Suppose I have a document with multiple include or input statements

\input{fileA}
\input{fileB}

etc.

Is there an easy way to generate a single .tex file where \input{fileA} is replaced by the actual content of fileA etc. without copying it manually?

Best Answer

You can use the following tools to do this. All of them are on CTAN but not all of them are part of either TeXLive or MikTeX, so you may need to manually install them. They need either Perl or a C compiler installed. Both should not be a problem with Linux but might be one under Windows or Mac. However IIRC TeXLive installs its own Perl interpreter.

latexpand Perl script:

Latexpand is a Perl script that simply replaces \input and \include commands with the content of the file input/included. The script does not deal with \includeonly commands.

Installation:

Simply download it from http://mirrors.ctan.org/support/latexpand/latexpand and run it. You need Perl installed however.

Usage:

    perl latexpand mainfile.tex > newfile.tex

flatex

A C program to flatten a LaTeX file into a single file, by explicitly including the files included by \include and \input commands. Also, if BibTeX is being used, then includes the bbl file into the resulting file. The result is therefore a stand-alone LaTeX file that can be emailed to a collaborator.

Installation:

Get the single C file and compile it, e.g. with cc flatex.c -o flatex.

Usage:

    flatex mainfile.tex > newfile.tex

flatten

A program to flatten a LaTeX root file by copying \input and \include files into the root file.

Installation:

Get the ZIP file from CTAN, unpack it and run make followed by make install. You need a C compiler and maybe flex for this. However it seems quite old and you might run in trouble because of it. I failed compiling it!

Usage:

    flatten mainfile.tex newfile.tex

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] \input only part of a file

Here is an approach in pure TeX (well, e-TeX). The main idea is: to select a range of lines in a file, sed is overkill, TeX is more than enough. As a bonus, no temporary file is needed.

\documentclass[a4paper]{article}
\usepackage[ascii]{inputenc}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage{lmodern}

\makeatletter
\newread\pin@file
\newcounter{pinlineno}
\newcommand\pin@accu{}
\newcommand\pin@ext{pintmp}
% inputs #3, selecting only lines #1 to #2 (inclusive)
\newcommand*\partialinput [3] {%
  \IfFileExists{#3}{%
    \openin\pin@file #3
    % skip lines 1 to #1 (exclusive)
    \setcounter{pinlineno}{1}
    \@whilenum\value{pinlineno}<#1 \do{%
      \read\pin@file to\pin@line
      \stepcounter{pinlineno}%
    }
    % prepare reading lines #1 to #2 inclusive
    \addtocounter{pinlineno}{-1}
    \let\pin@accu\empty
    \begingroup
    \endlinechar\newlinechar
    \@whilenum\value{pinlineno}<#2 \do{%
      % use safe catcodes provided by e-TeX's \readline
      \readline\pin@file to\pin@line
      \edef\pin@accu{\pin@accu\pin@line}%
      \stepcounter{pinlineno}%
    }
    \closein\pin@file
    \expandafter\endgroup
    \scantokens\expandafter{\pin@accu}%
  }{%
    \errmessage{File `#3' doesn't exist!}%
  }%
}
\makeatother

% for testing purpose
\begin{filecontents}{pitest}
5 You shouldn't see this.\par
6 Let the fun begin!
7 \iffalse
8 bla
9 \fi

11 New paragraph.
12 \verb*+\foo (two  spaces)~_$^+ bla
13 You shouldn't see this.\par
\end{filecontents}

\begin{document}

\partialinput{6}{12}{pitest} random text

\end{document}

I think/hope this approach is robust, mostly thanks to e-TeX's \readline. See the included test file for potential edge cases that do work.

[Tex/LaTex] Inputting multiple files in LaTeX

My suggestion is to create one file with all the \input lines automatically and use \input to include this file (and hence, all desired files) into your main document. The best way to keep everything up to date would be a Makefile. On a Unix system you can use this command line to create the file with the input lines:

ls dir/*.tex | awk '{printf "\\input{%s}\n", $1}' > inputs.tex

You would only update inputs.tex once in a while (or automatically) but always use \input{inputs.tex} in your main document. The beauty of using ls (or find) is that you can combine naming some files explicitly and others using shell (glob) patterns to control what files are included in what order.

Makefile

The GNU Make Makefile rule to do this automatically would look like this:

.PHONY: all
all:   inputs.tex

inputs.tex: $(wildcard dir/*.tex)
  ls dir/*.tex | awk '{printf "\\input{%s}\n", $$1}' > inputs.tex

A call to make would trigger updating the all target, which in turn would update inputs.tex if any of the included TeX files has changed or a new one was added.

Shell Escapes

Reading about shell escapes in PDFLaTeX in the solution mentioned by Faheem Mitha, here is another idea: one could also execute the command line mentioned above from within the LaTeX source file and read \input{inputs.tex} after that. However, I haven't tried this.

Best Answer

Installation:

Usage:

Installation:

Usage:

Installation:

Usage:

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] \input only part of a file

[Tex/LaTex] Inputting multiple files in LaTeX

Makefile

Shell Escapes

Related Question