[luatex] Building a PDF with Lua code, without a TeX stub

[luigi scarso]

On Thu, Oct 20, 2016 at 8:25 AM, Deepak Jois <deepak.jois at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi
> I would like to invoke the LuaTeX interpreter with a Lua file which
> does the node building etc, and then calls something like
> tex.shipout(), which can generate a PDF. I am aware of the --lua flag,
> but the file passed to that flag executes before the TeX engine is
> fully initialised. So that’s not what I am looking for
>
> For example, lets say I have a Lua file with code:
>
> <code>
> -- Page settings
> tex.pagewidth = "210mm"
> tex.pageheight = "297mm"
> tex.hsize = "210mm"
>
> -- Set the paragraph indentation
> tex.parindent = "20pt"
>
> tex.sprint("hello world")
> </code>
>
> and I want to generate a PDF from it directly using the luatex
> command. I cannot seem to do that right now, and I require a stub TeX
> file like this.
>
> <code>
> \outputmode=1 % this could be avoided if I pass --output-format=pdf
> \directlua{dofile('code.lua')}
> \bye
> </code>
>
> Questions:
>
> - Is there a way to avoid creating the stub TeX file?
>
> - If not, is it something worth adding (or possible to add) as a
> feature to the LuaTeX program?
>
> Deepak
>
you can consider to build your own format and run it by a wrapper
as done in context in the minimals

$ cat z.lua
for k,v in pairs(_G) do print(k,v) end

$ mtxrun --script plain z.lua

mtx-plain       | running command 'luatex --fmt=luatex-plain  "z.lua"'
_G table: 0x20f4390
status table: 0x21a38f0
loadfile function: 0x50dda4
rawlen function: 0x718c9c
tostring function: 0x719886
font table: 0x21a40a0
coroutine table: 0x20f60d0
collectgarbage function: 0x718dd4
lua table: 0x2104f10
string table: 0x20f7c40
mbox table: 0x210ea60
print function: 0x718695
zlib table: 0x21601c0
arg table: 0x21b6c00
fontloader table: 0x2199f90
ltn12 table: 0x2128ab0
lpeg table: 0x20fd7b0
lfs table: 0x20fcc70
module function: 0x20f5ff0
load function: 0x71934c
io table: 0x20f6bb0
socket table: 0x20f7ce0
texio table: 0x21a12e0
tex table: 0x2145ad0
error function: 0x718a97
md5 table: 0x20fc700
ipairs function: 0x719117
profiler table: 0x20fd2d0
rawset function: 0x718d67
mplib table: 0x21a5bf0
rawequal function: 0x718c41
table: 0x20f4390
tonumber function: 0x718803
unicode table: 0x20f7710
getmetatable function: 0x718b29
epdf table: 0x21b1f60
require function: 0x20f6060
pairs function: 0x719068
rawget function: 0x718d0b
vf table: 0x21a5db0
_VERSION Lua 5.2
select function: 0x7195bb
setmetatable function: 0x718b8b
lang table: 0x21a4910
type function: 0x718ee0
callback table: 0x21a2370
debug table: 0x20f95e0
zip table: 0x20fbc80
texconfig table: 0x21b2b00
kpse table: 0x21050f0
dofile function: 0x50debd
next function: 0x719006
xpcall function: 0x7197cf
bit32 table: 0x20fc1c0
assert function: 0x719556
os table: 0x20f72a0
gzip table: 0x21607d0
package table: 0x20f4b80
pcall function: 0x719747
math table: 0x20f5bf0
table table: 0x20f68d0
mime table: 0x2106c90
pdfscanner table: 0x21b2a60

-- 
luigi