luatex

extended TeX engine with embedded Lua scripting

TLDR

Compile LaTeX document

$ luatex [document.tex]

Compile LuaLaTeX document

$ lualatex [document.tex]

Compile with shell escape

$ luatex --shell-escape [document.tex]

Compile to DVI

$ luatex --output-format=dvi [document.tex]

Specify output directory

$ luatex --output-directory=[dir] [document.tex]

LuaTeX is an extended version of pdfTeX with Unicode and OpenType font support, embedded Lua scripting, the e-TeX and Omega extensions, and an integrated MetaPost engine. It can produce both PDF and DVI output. The engine combines the typesetting power of TeX with Lua programming, enabling dynamic document generation and advanced customization.LuaLaTeX is the LaTeX format for LuaTeX, commonly used as a modern replacement for pdfLaTeX. LuaTeX can also be invoked as texlua (a Lua interpreter with TeX-related libraries) or texluac (a Lua bytecode compiler).

PARAMETERS

--fmt format

Format file to use.

--output-format fmt

pdf or dvi.

--output-directory dir

Output directory.

--shell-escape

Enable shell commands.

--interaction mode

Set interaction mode: batchmode, nonstopmode, scrollmode, or errorstopmode.

--halt-on-error

Stop on first error.

--lua file

Lua initialization file. When present, LuaTeX enters an alternative mode of command-line parsing.

--luaonly

Start LuaTeX as a Lua interpreter only, not a TeX engine.

--safer

Disable Lua commands that can be abused by malicious documents.

--nosocket

Disable the luasocket (network) library.

--synctex NUMBER

Enable/disable SyncTeX extension for source-PDF synchronization.

--jobname STRING

Set the job name to STRING.

--draftmode

Skip PDF output and image reading for faster compilation.

LUA IN DOCUMENTS

$ \directlua{
  tex.print("Hello from Lua!")
  for i=1,5 do
    tex.print(i)
  end
}

INSTALL

sudo apt install texlive-binaries

sudo dnf install texlive-luatex

sudo pacman -S texlive-luatex

sudo apk add texlive-luatex

sudo zypper install texlive-luatex

CAVEATS

Slower than pdfLaTeX for simple documents. Some packages need adaptation for the LuaTeX engine. Memory usage is higher than other TeX engines. Natively supports Unicode (UTF-8 input).

HISTORY

LuaTeX development started in 2007 by Taco Hoekwater, Hartmut Henkel, and Hans Hagen as a successor to pdfTeX with scripting capabilities.