[texworks] Synctex with texi2dvi?

[Bruno Voisin]

On 10 août 2010, at 03:38, Duncan Murdoch wrote:

> I've just installed Ubuntu to try to get Sweave and TexWorks going
> there.  I've got TexLive installed.  I had been using texi2dvi in
> MikTex in Windows, but now the texi2dvi option
> --tex-options=-synctex=1 doesn't work.  Is there some way to tell
> texi2dvi to pass the synctex option to pdflatex?

This must be a MikTeX-specific extension. Here on the Mac texi2dvi and texi2pdf are part of the OS (they're installed in /usr/bin) and they don't include any option for passing on arguments to (pdf)TeX:

	$ texi2dvi --help
	[...]

	Operation modes:
	  -b, --batch         no interaction
	  -c, --clean         remove all auxiliary files
	  -D, --debug         turn on shell debugging (set -x)
	  -h, --help          display this help and exit successfully
	  -o, --output=OFILE  leave output in OFILE (implies --clean);
	                      Only one input FILE may be specified in this case
	  -q, --quiet         no output unless errors (implies --batch)
	  -s, --silent        same as --quiet
	  -v, --version       display version information and exit successfully
	  -V, --verbose       report on what is done

	TeX tuning:
	  -@                   use @input instead of \input; for preloaded Texinfo
	  -e, -E, --expand     force macro expansion using makeinfo
	  -I DIR               search DIR for Texinfo files
	  -l, --language=LANG  specify the LANG of FILE (LaTeX or Texinfo)
	  -p, --pdf            use pdftex or pdflatex for processing
	  -r, --recode         call recode before TeX to translate input characters
	  -t, --command=CMD    insert CMD in copy of input file
	   or --texinfo=CMD    multiple values accumulate

	The values of the BIBTEX, LATEX (or PDFLATEX), MAKEINDEX, MAKEINFO,
	TEX (or PDFTEX), TEXINDEX, and THUMBPDF environment variables are used
	to run those commands, if they are set.  Any CMD strings are added
	after @setfilename for Texinfo input, in the first line for LaTeX input.
	[...]

I think they are exactly the same scripts installed on GNU/Linux.

What you could perhaps do is write a script setting first TEX to "tex --synctex=1" and PDFTEX to "pdftex --synctex=1" then calling texi2dvi. Something like

	#!/bin/tcsh
	set TEX= ("$TEX --synctex=1")
	set PDFTEX= ("$PDFTEX --synctex=1")
	texi2dvi "$1"

The syntax is certainly wrong as I know nothing about shell scripts, and it is probably safer to add tests on whether TEX and PDFTEX are set in the first place.

Hope this helps,

Bruno Voisin