LaTeX setup for VSCode with pixi

1. Install VS Code and pixi.

2. Download (or clone) and open this repository with VS Code. It will suggest to install the LaTeX Workshop extension from James Wu. Install it.

3. Open article.tex from the file explorer (left side panel). The PDF is (re)compiled each time article.tex is saved, and saved to _build/article.pdf.

4. Click on the Open Preview icon (top right) or open the LaTeX workshop extension ($\TeX$ icon, left side panel) and click on View LaTeX PDF. A tab with the compiled PDF should open. Ctrl + click (Cmd + click) on the PDF takes you to the corresponding location in the source code (using SyncTeX).

How does it work?

The .vscode/extensions.json file is there to trigger a recomendation to install the LaTeX Workshop extension. It can be removed.

The .vscode/settings.json file defines a recipe to compile a LaTeX project. It uses tectonic, a modernized, complete, self-contained TeX/LaTeX engine. To run tectonic, it uses pixi run tectonic.

The file pixi.toml defines a dependency on the package tectonic, which will be installed on the .pixi directory. If it hasn't been installed yet, it is done automatically by calling pixi run tectonic.

After the first run, the .pixi directory will be created, which contains a conda environment with the tectonic binary. Also, a pixi.lock file will be created, which contains a description of everything installed in the environment.

Caveats

For each new LaTeX package added to article.tex, tectonic requires internet access since it downloads required LaTeX packages on demand. They are cached for subsequent runs.