samcarter
One disadvantage of working with dtx files is, that it is imho harder to test changes. Before compiling one's test documents, one needs to first unpack the .cls or .sty files. This means one can't just jump around the git history and hit compile to see when something broke etc.
Are there any ways to automatically unpack the dtx files or otherwise make working with dtx files more comfortable?
Top Answer
samcarter
# Git to the rescue!
One can use git hooks to automatically unpack the .dtx files when one commits a change, checks out a specific commit, pulls commits from a repository etc.
To do this, create files with the names
- `post-checkout`
- `post-commit`
- `post-merge`
in the folder `./.git/hooks/`. Make sure these files are executable.
You can add instructions for unpacking the dtx files in each of these scripts, e.g.
```
l3build install
```
or
```
latex xbeamer.ins
```
or however else you are unpacking your dtx files. Git will then execute these scripts after a commit, a pull or a check out.
There are many other git hooks available if the 3 mentioned above don't cover all your use cases.
(depending on your OS and if you use git from a command line or a gui, it might be necessary to use the full path to `l3build` or `latex` if git can't find them)
Answer #2
samcarter
# Hammerspoon
If you are a mac user, you could use the menu bar program [Hammerspoon](https://github.com/Hammerspoon/hammerspoon) to watch for any changes to one of your dtx files and automagically unpack it.
Place the following in your Hammerspoon configuration file `init.lua`:
```lua
function WatchDTX(files)
doUnpack = false
for _, file in pairs(files) do
if (file:sub(-4) == ".dtx") then
doUnpack = true
end
end
if doUnpack then
print("Unpack dtx")
os.execute("cd ~/latex/xbeamer ; latex xbeamer.ins")
end
end
myWatcherDTX = hs.pathwatcher.new("~/latex/xbeamer", WatchDTX):start()
```
(replace `~/latex/xbeamer` with the folder which contains your dtx files, depending on your path settings, `latex` might need to be called with the full path)