PythonTeX executes code in LaTeX documents and allows the output to be included in the original document. It supports Python as well as Bash, JavaScript, Julia, Octave, Perl, R, Raku (Perl 6), Ruby, Rust, and SageMath. PythonTeX also provides syntax highlighting for typeset code in LaTeX documents via the Pygments syntax highlighter.
See pythontex_quickstart.pdf
to get started, and pythontex_gallery.pdf
for examples of what is possible with PythonTeX. PythonTeX is included in TeX
Live and MiKTeX and may be installed via the package manager. See
pythontex.pdf
for detailed installation instructions if you want to
install the current development version, or just use the installation script
for TeX Live and MiKTeX.
The depythontex
utility creates a copy of a PythonTeX document in which
all code has been replaced by its output. This plain LaTeX document is
more suitable for journal submission, sharing, or conversion to other document
formats. See pythontex_gallery.html
and the accompanying conversion
script for an example of a PythonTeX document that was converted to HTML via
depythontex
and Pandoc.
LaTeX document
doc.tex
:\documentclass{article} \usepackage{pythontex} \newcommand{\pymultiply}[2]{\py{#1*#2}} \begin{document} \begin{pycode} print("Python says ``Hello!''") \end{pycode} $8 \times 256 = \pymultiply{8}{256}$ \end{document}
Compiling under Windows:
pdflatex -interaction=nonstopmode doc.tex pythontex doc.tex pdflatex -interaction=nonstopmode doc.tex
Compiling under other operating systems:
pdflatex -interaction=nonstopmode doc.tex pythontex.py doc.tex pdflatex -interaction=nonstopmode doc.tex
Output:
Python says “Hello!” 8 × 256 = 2048
Notice that there is a three-step compile process. This is what makes
possible commands like \pymultiply
that use Python or other languages
internally. You may want to configure your LaTeX editor with a shortcut for
running pythontex
or pythontex.py
, or configure your LaTeX build
system to run pythontex
or pythontex.py
.
If you use PythonTeX in your writing and research, please consider citing it in any resulting publications. The best and most recent paper is in Computational Science & Discovery (doi:10.1088/1749-4699/8/1/014010). You may also cite the paper in the 2013 SciPy proceedings.
Starting in 2020, I have increasingly used Markdown and HTML instead of PythonTeX and LaTeX when creating new teaching materials. I can no longer make major time investments in open-source software that I do not use frequently myself. PythonTeX v0.19 is under development. It will address some minor bugs and incompatibilities that have developed with Python and dependencies over the last few years. After v0.19, there should be occasional releases to keep PythonTeX running, but no major changes or significant new features are anticipated.
I have been developing Codebraid since 2019, partially to have a PythonTeX equivalent for Markdown but also in the hope that it could eventually be integrated with LaTeX as a PythonTeX replacement. I currently have a grant to develop minted v3.0, and as part of this am creating new software for passing data between LaTeX and Python. I cannot make any guarantees, but I hope that this will eventually make it possible to create a new LaTeX package based on Codebraid, with significant PythonTeX compatibility.
LPPL for LaTeX code and BSD 3-Clause for Python code.