
Copyright © 2003 Jonathan Pechta
Copyright © 2003, 2005, 2006 Federico Zenith
Copyright © 2005, 2006, 2012 Holger Danielsson
Copyright © 2007 Thomas Braun
Copyright © 2007, 2011 Michel Ludwig
Copyright © 2011 Felix Mauch
Kile is a TEX and LATEX source editor and shell.
Table of Contents
- 1. Preface
- 2. Introduction
- 3. Quickstart
- 4. Starting a New Document
- 5. Editing LATEX Documents
- 6. Code Completion
- 7. Wizards and Dialogs
- 8. Special Tags in LATEX
- 9. User-Configurable Menu
- 10. The Build Tools
- 11. Navigating the LATEX Source
- 12. Projects
- 13. Document Encoding
- 14. Scripting
- 15. Help
- 16. Credits and License

To run Kile, you need to have the following components installed on your system:
K Desktop environment (KDE): KDE is a popular open-source desktop environment.
Qt™: Qt™ is a C++ GUI and network library needed to compile Kile.
LATEX: high-quality document typesetting program. Most likely you want the TeX Live (or on older systems the teTEX) package, if you are on a UNIX®-like system.
Most of these items might be included in your Linux® distribution; please refer to your distribution documentation, or refer to your installation CD or DVD, for adding these packages to your computer.
Kile might also be available as a pre-compiled package for your Linux® distribution already. Please check with the package manager of your distribution.

This manual is intended for any individual, regardless of her or his experience with LATEX, KDE, Kile or Linux®.
Advanced users are not likely to read this manual, but all suggestions on documentation will be considered. If you would like to contribute to this project or the documentation, please consult the Kile web page.
Do you need answers about Kile? Are you stuck with the compilation process? Do you want to see a new
feature implemented? The preferred way to ask technical questions or to start a discussion is to
use our mailing list: (kile-devel AT lists.sourceforge.net)
.

Kile is an integrated LATEX environment for the KDE desktop. Kile gives you the ability to use all the functionality of LATEX in a graphical interface, giving you easy, immediate, and customized access to all programs for LATEX code-completion, compiling, postprocessing, debugging, conversion and viewing tools; you also get very handy wizards, a LATEX reference and a powerful project manager.
Kile is based on the Kate editor component, i.e. a lot of its editing capabilities stem from the Kate editor component itself. Kile extends these capabilities with features to edit LATEX documents. To learn more about the Kate editor component and its capabilities, see the Kate webpage.
LATEX is a text-processing system derived from TEX, a program developed originally in 1977 by Donald Knuth to help layout text in a professional way and obtain a layout quality that is on a par with the work of a professional typesetter. LATEX was created by Leslie Lamport to give authors an automatic typesetter, especially to ease the expensive and painstaking process of typesetting of mathematical formulas and expressions, which are enclosed within dollar signs in LATEX for a reason. Today, word-processing programs let any user act as typesetter, but what is often needed is a document that simply looks good without having to spend hours to bring it into shape. LATEX takes that burden on its shoulders, and lets you concentrate on the document instead of on the layout. And yes, it will look good!
There is a funny tradition of TEX-related packages to have the strangest pronunciation and typesetting possible. TEX was supposed to be brought in from the Greek τεχ, in Latin letters tech. There are a lot of explanations why, but most likely it is because TEX was originally conceived for technical reports, and indeed its foremost ability was the correct and easy typesetting of mathematical formulae, then an extremely expensive, time-consuming and frustrating business.
The pronunciation is supposed to be as follows: T as you would expect, E as in get, and X as in the German ich. If you do not know what ch sounds like, it is more or less like the sound a hissing cat produces; the IPA symbol is /ç/. Many people report a different pronunciation of ach (IPA symbol /x/), but according to some Greeks, the first version is indeed correct. You should be aware that a lot of people mispronounce TEX as /teks/ or /tek/.
Last, in LATEX the first LA is pronounced as lay: the idea being, while raw TEX is difficult, even a layman can use LATEX macros. A less inspiring, but more realistic explanation is that it stems from the surname of Leslie Lamport, the creator of LATEX. Now you know!

The LATEX typesetting system is similar to other markup languages such as XML, which is used in many types of documents (including the one you are reading), or HTML, which is used for web pages. The general idea behind markup languages is to have special keywords, called tags, that tell a program (a word processor, a web browser, or the LATEX compiler) how the text enclosed within the tags is to be interpreted. Kile offers a number of such tags in the menu in the menu bar.
While we will try to give you a good idea of what LATEX is, this document is, of course, not The Definitive Book on LATEX. If you want to learn LATEX in depth, you may want to borrow a specialized book from your local library.
As with any other markup language, LATEX documents contain a preamble, which
defines global properties, such as paper size, page numbering, dimensions of the text on the page,
and a document body, which contains the text of the document. The preamble is composed
at least of the \documentclass
command. It precedes the document body, which
starts with the command \begin{document}
and is concluded with the command
\end{document}
.

The QuickStart wizard built into Kile is a useful feature to quickly start creating documents in Kile. Choosing the wizard from the menubar gives you several choices for the creation of your document. You can also specify some options related to the document right away.
Class options:
Document Class: choose the type of document you want to create: article, book, letter, report, scrartcl, scrreprt, scrbook, prosper, beamer or other custom-defined.
Typeface Size: tell Kile what point size (pt) you want to use.
Paper Size: choose the size or style of sheets.
Encoding: In general it is a good idea to use your system's standard encoding. Modern systems now move more and more to UTF-8 as the standard encoding. If you can, use utf8 or utf8x (which is indeed the correct spelling for LATEX documents).
Other options: this allows you to set further options such as printing, draft, and others.
Packages
This lists some of the most common additional packages used in LATEX. Select the check box to include it.
Document Properties:
Author: put your name here.
Title: add the document title here.
Date: specify the date.
The predefined templates in Kile are:
Empty document: real freaks start from scratch!
Article: sets the article format, for a document short enough not to be broken down to chapters.
Report: sets the report format, for a middle-sized document, with, for example, page numbering on the page's outer edge.
Book: sets the book format, a full-fledged flavor, so powerful that it is used to write many university textbooks.
Letter: sets the letter format.
Beamer, HA-Prosper: create nice presentations in PDF with a superior look and all LATEX power.
Powerdot: Powerdot is the follower of the packages
seminar
andHA-Prosper
. It does not have as many options as Beamer, but it is easy to use and it can create really nice presentations in PDF.Scrartcl, Scrbook, Scrreprt, Scrlttr2: the KOMA-Script document classes, especially adapted to German typography. Use them whenever you write German texts.
Xelatex: a modified
Article
template to use withXeLaTeX
.
Note that all of these templates can be adjusted to the user's requirements.
New users need not worry: this list is just a brief description of the available features, and a more detailed description can be found in Quickstart.
Kile is similar to other programs that deal with source code and editing, and will automatically highlight commands, options and items that are used (and abused). Kile makes it possible to easily spot problematic areas: for example, if you see major areas of text turn green, it is likely that you forgot to close a math environment somewhere.
The auto-completion of environments means that, when you begin a new environment by typing
\begin{environment}
, Kile will automatically insert a matching
\end{environment}
command, with a line in between them
for your text. You can of course deactivate it if you want in
→ → +Environments.
All documents are normally structured in a hierarchy of some type. LATEX allows you to break up documents into the following hierarchy (part being highest in the hierarchy, and subparagraph being lowest):
\part
\chapter
\section
\subsection
\subsubsection
\paragraph
\subparagraph
When viewing a document in the Structure view, you can jump between elements by clicking on the element you would like to view.
When creating your own LATEX files, inverse search can be very helpful. Once you have created a DVI file (DeVice Independent File) or PDF file, you can click the left mouse button while pressing Shift in the viewer and Kile will jump to the corresponding line in the LATEX source code.
A DVI is a type of file containing a description of a formatted document, along with other information including character font, and is besides PDF the usual output of TEX or LATEX. A number of utilities exist to view, convert and print DVI files on various systems and devices.
When using inverse search, the selection of items in the DVI or PDF file is associated with the editor, so when you click on the DVI or PDF file, the main window jumps to the corresponding section of LATEX code in the editor. Forward search is the exact opposite of this. Forward search will allow you to click on a specific section of text in the LATEX code, and jump to the associated position in the viewer window.

: begin a new document.
: open a new document.
: close your document.
: this is used when working with multiple files. Having a master document will let you work more easily with other
.tex
files included in your document. If you are using projects, you can also set in → a project-wide master document.: compiles your LATEX source code and displays the results automatically unless there are errors contained in the document.
: this mode will "watch" the DVI file for changes, and will not launch a new session of Okular after .
: views the
.log
file, so you can spot errors.: jumps backward through the
.log
file and highlights errors in the source.: jumps forward through the
.log
file and highlights errors in the source.: halts current tool.
: runs LATEX on the active document.
: launches DVI viewer.
: converts a DVI to a PostScript® (PS).
: launches PostScript® (PS) viewer.
: runs PDFLATEX on the active document.
: launches the PDF viewer.
: converts a DVI to a PDF.
: converts a PS to a PDF.
: views HTML created.
: jump to the page of the DVI file that corresponds to the current line in the editor.
: jump to the page of the PDF file that corresponds to the current line in the editor.
If you look at the Edit toolbar, you will notice three large drop-down menus. The drop-down menus were designed for you to be able to quickly add certain common features into your document. The first drop down box is used for quickly dividing your document by parts, chapter, sections and so on; the available commands to add segments to your LATEX source code are:
part: highest level of sectioning for a document.
chapter: starts a new chapter.
section: create a new section.
subsection: create a new subsection.
subsubsection: a secondary section between subsection and paragraph.
paragraph: create a new paragraph.
subparagraph: create a new subparagraph.
The drop down box named Other is used to insert items into your document such as indexes, footnotes, and references; the available commands are:
label: a command that produces a label for a chapter, a figure or another element.
index: creates an entry for the index.
footnote: creates a footnote in your document.
ref: used to refer to a predefined label, which you can choose from a drop-down list.
pageref: just like ref, but refers to a page instead of a structure element.
cite: create a reference with data from a bibliography.

The Other drop-down menu

Selecting the label for a reference
When using cite, you are presented with a drop-down list of bibitems, but if you are using BibTEX this will only work if the file belongs to a Project. For editing BibTEX files the usage of specialized editors is recommended. The author has had good results with KBibTEX. Of course you can also write the BibTEX files by hand inside Kile.
The last drop down box labeled tiny is used to set the size of the text. You can set the size of the main text, of footnotes, and so on. The available commands are:
tiny: smallest.
scriptsize: very small.
footnotesize: smaller.
small: small.
normalsize: normal.
large: large.
Large: larger.
LARGE: even larger.
huge: still larger.
Huge: largest.

Users of Kile have two choices when starting a new document: they can use the to begin a new document, select the type of document they would like to create and options such as font size, paper size, and so on; otherwise, they can write the code by hand.
\documentclass[12pt]{article} \begin{document} Here is a bunch of text coded in \LaTeX. \end{document}
Every document in LATEX begins with the command
\documentclass[optional argument]{class}
, where class specifies the document type.
Typing in the code example above from the text box gives you the following output:

Compiled text in DVI output
The brackets that come after the command \documentclass
contain the options for the command. The option [12pt]
sets the size
of the font for your article; if you do not set the font size in the beginning, you can set
it later in the text.
Once you have typed in the code example from the box above, you will need to compile your LATEX source code. The easiest way for you to compile LATEX is to use the menu, or using the Quickbuild button.
Alt+2 is the keyboard shortcut to compile your source code.
You have to save your source code before you can compile; Kile will do this automatically for you.
If your document did not compile, check the log for errors. When using the Quickbuild key, the Okular viewer should be launched automatically; if it does not, look at the log.

An environment is a segment of text that is managed differently
from the rest of the document. For example, you create a report with font size 12,
but you need to change your font size for a few sentences. The commands
\begin{environment}
, \huge
and
\end{environment}
will let you temporarily alter the text inside
the environment commands to be size huge.
Changes are only effective from \begin{environment}
to
\end{environment}
. There are no limits as to how many changes
you can make inside an environment.
There are many features you can add to your document that will make it more
readable and user-friendly. You can add features such as specific fonts, bold, italics,
underline etc. to your document, and these commands will end with either an
\end
command, or at the end of your environment.
\begin{emph}
: this command makes text italicized, and is valid until the code comes across a\end{emph}
, or another environment. To italicize one word in a sentence, you can use the syntax: this is\emph{my}
sentence.\textbf{I am making this text inside the brackets bold}
: this command makes your text bold.\quote
: to create a quote inside your document; begin your quote with\begin{quote}
and end it with\end{quote}
.\center
: centers the text.\verse
: creates offset text for poems.\itemize
: makes an itemized list.

Now that we have given you some background about how to write code using the LATEX markup language, we will show you how to create a document using Kile step-by-step.
Start Kile.
Select → , then choose a format, and set your preferences in the wizard.
Once the wizard has entered text, do some customization to make the document more readable, add a minimum of one quote, some bold text, italics, and a verse to see the difference between the commands.
Save your file, and give it the name
intro.tex
.Build your document using Alt+2, or the button labeled LaTeX.
Select .
Check out all your new text.
When you are done viewing your document, click the button or press Ctrl+E to return to the editor if you are using the embedded viewer, or close the viewer window if you are using a separate viewer.
That's it! You have just created your first LATEX document!
Once you have created your DVI, you will be able to print your document, or change it into a PostScript® or PDF file if you want. Experiment and have fun!

DVI stands for DeVice Independent file. These files are produced
by TEX or LATEX to be read by a driver of some sort on your computer. There are many different types of output that
a .dvi
can be sent to, such as a printer, PostScript® or PDF file converter, or your computer screen.
You have already seen how to view a DVI file on the screen by using the button in the toolbar.
To print a DVI, you can use the same process that you used to create your document earlier (see Using Kile). At step 7, after clicking , select → in the viewer, and if you have your printer properly configured, you will be able to print the DVI.

The forward search functions allow you to jump from your editor directly to the associated position of the DVI or PDF file.
Kile offers a configuration with this option for all LATEX binaries. Go to → → +Build and always choose the Modern configuration.
To execute a forward search, position the cursor on a line of source code, and click Forward Search to jump to the associated position in the DVI or PDF viewer window.

Inverse search is a very useful feature when you are writing a LATEX document yourself. If everything is set up properly, you can click into Okular's window with the mouse button while pressing Shift. After that Kile loads the LATEX source file and jumps to the proper paragraph. To use inverse search, you have to compile your LATEX file with the Modern configuration.
Inverse search cannot work unless:
The source file has been compiled successfully.
Okular knows which editor you would like to use.
With this feature of Okular, a left mouse click while pressing Shift in the DVI or PDF document will result in Kile opening the corresponding LATEX document and attempt to go to the corresponding line. Remember to tell Okular to use Kile as a text editor, in Okular's menu item → (on the page ).

Configuring Okular

If you are trying to use quickbuild, and the DVI viewer does not open, chances are you have an error. If you have an error, it will be visible in the log file / message area, and the summary of the error will be given.
The log file will explain the source of the error in your code. In the editor, you can use the buttons in the toolbar labeled and to jump to and from errors. The log file always states in which line the error occurred. To view the line where an error occurred, click on the error in the log window, and Kile will take you to the error's line.

When you click the button in the toolbar to begin a new document a dialog appears, asking which type of template you would like to use to write your document. The default choices are:
Empty document
Article
Beamer
Book
HA-Prosper
Powerdot
Letter
Report
Scrartcl (from the KOMA-Script package)
Scrbook (from the KOMA-Script package)
Scrlttr2 (from the KOMA-Script package)
Scrreprt (from the KOMA-Script package)
PDF
XeLaTeX
If you selected an Empty document, you can either start writing a document from scratch, or you can use the wizard to quickly start a new document (see QuickStart Wizard).
Frequent users of LATEX typically use the same preamble for almost every document they use. Templates can be created, saved and loaded within Kile to make it easier to start a new document.
To create a new template, you must first either open a TEX / LATEX file, or create a file of your own. Kile can generate a template from an existing document by opening the desired document and selecting → .
When creating a new document by selecting a template from → , certain character combinations will be replaced by data such as your name, or the character encoding you are using. These variables can be configured in → → +General.
When designing your own template, it is useful to know which character combinations are replaced by which template variables:
$$AUTHOR$$
: This string will be replaced by the author variable.$$DOCUMENTCLASSOPTIONS$$
: This string will be replaced by the documentclass options variable. Typically this is used as follows:\documentclass[$$DOCUMENTCLASSOPTIONS$$]{article}
.$$INPUTENCODING$$
: If the inputencoding variable is set to, say,latin1
this string is replaced by\input[latin1]{inputenc}
.
The easiest way to create a new template is to start the wizard, and then add commands in the editor. Once you have your document set up the way you like:
Save your file;
Go to ;
Choose ;
Make any corrections necessary to the template;
Enter a name for your new template;
Click to add your template to the menu.
Next time you start up a new document, you will be able to choose your customized template instead of the default ones.
A template can be created from any LATEX file. If you are looking for an easy way to configure a template, go find one you like on the Internet and follow the same steps as listed in Create a Template from the Wizard.
For instance, you may want to create a full-fledged A0 poster. These posters are usually seen
at scientific conferences, and LATEX will help you make an attractive, catchy poster. You can get a
template for A0 posters at Jonathan Marchini's
home page, but many more are available. Remember that you will need the a0poster
package, which is normally not included in standard TEX distributions. Download it from
here and place it in the same folder as your LATEX file.

The internal editor that Kile uses is Kate. Kate is a text editor created for programmers, which incorporates the ability to read and highlight many different types of text files, among which are LATEX and BibTEX; you can access many options for Kate directly from Kile's menu.
To learn more about Kate and its capabilities, see the Kate Handbook. Kile users can start reading from the chapter “Working with the Kate Editor”.
Kile features a very practical LATEX tag reference, which you can access by choosing → . It contains a thorough description of almost all the commands that you may use in LATEX and their syntax.

To select text, you have the following options:
Hold left mouse button, and drag mouse to highlight text.
Click once on a word to move the cursor to a new area.
Click twice on a word to select the whole word.
Click twice on a word and pressing Ctrl to select the whole TEX word. This means clicking in this way on
\par
from\par\bigskip
only select \par.Click three times to select the whole sentence.
Holding the left mouse button, and dragging the text you want to select, automatically copies the selected text to the clipboard.
Holding Shift and using the arrow keys allows you to select portions of the source code in the editor window.

Bracket completion is a visual tool that the editor view uses to indicate to you
which bracket matches which. If you open any .tex
file,
and select any bracket, whether it be a parenthesis (), square brackets [] or braces {}, the
editor will highlight the bracket and its match in yellow (this default color can be changed).
So, for example, if you position the cursor on the braces in
\section{Introduction}
, you would see
\section{Introduction}
in the default yellow highlight,
showing you the location of the beginning and ending brackets.

Many wizards can insert optional bullets, a special kind of bookmark within the text. The menu entries → or the corresponding keyboard shortcuts will allow you to jump to the next or last bullet. This will also highlight this bullet so that it will be deleted automatically, when you enter your first letter.

- (Ctrl+Alt+Right)
Jump to the next bullet in the text if there is one.
- (Ctrl+Alt+Left)
Jump to the previous bullet in the text if there is one.

Editing is of course one of the main aspects when you use a program like Kile. Although Kate already has great capabilities, Kile adds some important features, which are especially needed to write LATEX source. LATEX always needs a lot of environments and groups, so Kile supports very special commands to select them. Under → you will find the following commands to select text.

- (Ctrl+Alt+S,E)
Select an environment without the surrounding tags. If this command is called, when an environment is already selected, Kile will expand the selection to the next surrounding environment.
- (Ctrl+Alt+S,F)
Select an environment including the surrounding tags. This selection can also be expanded with a second call of this command.
- (Ctrl+Alt+S,T)
Select a TEX group inside the surrounding braces.
- (Ctrl+Alt+S,U)
Select a TEX group including the surrounding braces.
- (Ctrl+Alt+S,M)
Select the current math group including the math commands.
- (Ctrl+Alt+S,P)
Select a whole paragraph, i.e. a group of text lines separated on both sides by empty lines. A paragraph does not mean just continuous lines of text, as it is in other text editors. This extended meaning also includes tables, LATEX commands and all other lines of source. The only important thing for Kile is that this kind of paragraph is separated by two empty lines.
- (Ctrl+Alt+S,L)
Select the text line of the current cursor position.
- (Ctrl+Alt+S,W)
Select the word under the current cursor position. This selection has also en extended meaning, because this command can also select LATEX commands, which begin with a backslash and may also have an optional star at the end.
Kile has an extended feature to select LATEX commands. If you for example have typed
text \bfseries\itshape more text
and double click on one of the LATEX commands, both will be selected. But often you only want to select one of two or more commands. This can be done using the Ctrl key. You only have to press the Ctrl key and a double click will only select the desired command.

To delete some parts of a document you can of course select them, and then use the Delete key. Kate also offers the command Ctrl+K which deletes the whole line. But Kile offers a faster way with its own delete commands. Under → you will find the following commands to delete text.

- (Ctrl+Alt+T,E)
Delete an environment without the surrounding tags.
- (Ctrl+Alt+T,F)
Delete an environment including the surrounding tags.
- (Ctrl+Alt+T,T)
Delete a TEX group inside the surrounding braces.
- (Ctrl+Alt+T,U)
Delete a TEX group including the surrounding braces.
- (Ctrl+Alt+T,M)
Delete the current math group including the math commands.
- (Ctrl+Alt+T,P)
Delete a whole paragraph. Look at the → command, how a paragraph is defined in Kile.
- (Ctrl+Alt+T,I)
Delete the text from the current cursor position to the end of the line.
- (Ctrl+Alt+T,W)
Delete the word or LATEX command under the current cursor position.

It has already been mentioned that environments are a central point in LATEX. So Kile offers five other commands to make the work with LATEX as easy as possible under submenus → .

- (Ctrl+Alt+E,B)
This command will jump to the beginning of the current environment, wherever your current position is. The cursor will be placed directly in front of the opening environment tag.
- (Ctrl+Alt+E,E)
This command will jump to the end of the current environment, wherever your current position is. The cursor will be placed directly behind the closing environment tag.
- (Ctrl+Alt+E,M)
When your cursor is placed in front of or above the
\begin{environment}
tag, it will be moved to the opposite end of the environment and vice versa.- (Ctrl+Alt+E,C)
Typing a lot of nested environment tags, you may lose control of all those environments. This command will close the last opened environment, so that the nested structure of environments will not be broken.
- (Ctrl+Alt+E,A)
This closes all open environments, not only the last opened environment.

Kile also offers some special commands for LATEX groups,
which are determined by braces {...}
. In submenu
→
you will find some important commands, which correspond to those from
→ .

- (Ctrl+Alt+G,B)
This command will jump to the beginning of the current group, wherever your current position is. The cursor will be placed directly in front of the opening brace.
- (Ctrl+Alt+G,E)
This command will jump to the end of the current group, wherever your current position is. The cursor will be placed directly behind the closing brace.
- (Ctrl+Alt+G,M)
When your cursor is placed in front of or behind an opening brace of a TEX group, it will be moved to the opposite end of the group and vice versa.
- (Ctrl+Alt+G,C)
Typing a lot of nested group braces may be hard work. This command will close the last opened group, so that the nested structure of TEX groups will not be broken.

In LATEX, two single quotes are used as double quotes. To help you insert these efficiently, Kile allows you to press " to insert two opening single quotes. Furthermore, if you want to close a quotation, you also have to press ". Kile will be smart enough to recognize this situation and inserts two closing quotes for LATEX.
To get a literal double quote on the other side, press " twice.
You can enable or disable this auto insertion of opening and closing double quotes in section → → .

If you also include language-specific options
like ngerman
or french
,
you will also be able to use German or French double quotes. Many more languages are available.

If you press Ctrl+Return,
Kile inserts an intelligent newline. If your current position
is inside a list environment, like enumerate
or itemize
, Kile will not only insert
a newline, but also add a \item
command.
If you are inside a tabular environment, Kile will finish the
current line with \\
, followed by the newline.
If you are inside a LATEX comment, Kile will start the next line with a
%
.
Even better, Kile is smart enough to support predefined LATEX and user defined environments, which can be added in section → → .

Some users like to arrange columns in tabular environments and put all ampersand characters & beneath each other. Kile tries to support this. If you press Alt+Shift+&, Kile will look for the next tab in the row above. Although this tab may not be the corresponding tab, Kile will add some spaces to adjust the column position with the current tab.

Although Kate already offers a good completion mode, Kile extends code completion to support some special methods especially for LATEX. Five different modes are integrated. Three of them work on demand, the other two are autocompletion modes. All modes can be configured to work very differently at → .
When you begin a new environment, typing \begin{environment}
,
Kile will automatically add an \end{environment}
command, with a
line in between for your text.
Autocompletion can be turned off in the LATEX section of → → +Environments.

Completing an Equation Environment

When you type some letters, you can activate this completion mode for LATEX commands and normal words with → → or the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Shift+Space. Kile first reads the letters from the current cursor position to the left and stops at the first non-letter character or a backslash. If this pattern begins with a backslash, Kile will enter completion mode for TEX or LATEX commands. Otherwise it enters normal dictionary mode, where you will not find any LATEX commands. Depending on the chosen mode, a completion box will be opened. You will see all commands or words whose beginning matches the current pattern. You can navigate with the cursor keys through this list and select one entry with Enter or a double click with the mouse.

When you push the Backspace key, the last letter of your pattern will be deleted, and the completion list may grow. On the other hand, if you type another letter it will expand the pattern and the visible word list may shrink.
If you decide not to select any of the suggestions, you can leave this dialog with Esc.
You will see that all commands are written with a short description of their parameters. These descriptions are of course stripped when you select a command. Optionally you can let Kile insert bullets at these places, so that you can easily jump to these positions with → → and insert the parameter you want.

Go to → → +Complete to configure one or more of these lists. You can choose different word lists for TEX and LATEX commands and dictionary mode for normal words.
If you choose the option , the entries of all chosen compressed word list (cwl) files for LATEX command completion are shown in a separate view of Kile's sidebar. You will see which commands are available and what parameters and options must or can be given for a completion. You can also simply select one entry with a mouse click and it will be inserted into the document, with all named parameters and options stripped.

As each chosen word list will be shown in a separate view of its own, there could be too many views, so that Kile's main window may be larger than a small screen allows. As this looks very ugly, Kile works with a maximum number of allowed views, which by default is set to 10. If this value is too big for your screen, you should reduce it.

The command mode is not useful for code completion of environments.
You always have to type some letters of \begin
, and invoking
the completion mode will result in a huge list of environment tags. On the other
hand, environments are so often used that Kile offers a special mode for code completion of
environments. Forget the opening tag and write, for example, al
.
When you call the completion mode with
→ → or keyboard shortcut Alt+Shift+Space,
the opening tag is automatically added and you will see \begin{al}
.
After this change, the completion list is much less cluttered.

Now select an environment, and you will see that it is also automatically closed.
Even more, if Kile recognizes it as a list environment, it will also insert a first
\item
tag.

Go to → → +Complete to configure one or more of these lists. This mode uses the same word lists as the completion mode for TEX and LATEX commands.

Kile supports user defined lists of abbreviations, which are replaced
on demand by longer text strings. Look at
→ → +Complete
to configure one or more of these lists. For the example given here, the
abbreviation list in example.cwl
must be chosen.
In this file you will find, for example, the entry L=\LaTeX
.
For example, type only the letter L
. Now invoke
the abbreviation mode of word completion with
→ → or keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Alt+Space,
and the letter L
is replaced by the string
\LaTeX
.
Abbreviation completion also supports newline %n
and %C
to place the cursor, if these characters are present in the expansion text.
So if you have the entry
en1=\begin{enumerate}%n\item %C%n\end{enumerate}%n
in the completion file, and invoke the abbreviation completion,
the expansion looks as below, where x
shows the final cursor position.
\begin{enumerate} \item x \end{enumerate}

You can also enable an autocompletion mode for LATEX commands. When a given threshold of letters (default: 3) is entered, a popup window opens with a list of all matching LATEX commands. You can select one of these commands, or ignore this window and type further letters. The entries of the completion box will always change and match your currently typed word.
Go to → → +Complete to enable or disable this mode or to change the threshold.

Large dictionaries are not useful in autocompletion mode. But, we have seen that a lot of words in a document are typed more than once. So Kile offers a completion for all words from the document that the user has already typed. You can manually invoke this completion, if you press Ctrl+Space. Note that this mode is different from the completion mode for LATEX commands.
If you want to turn this mode on or off, go to → → → +Auto Completion. In this dialog you can configure if completion mode for document words should be enabled. There is also an additional autocompletion mode, where a completion box pops up, when a certain threshold is reached.

The latest specification of the completion file format can found in the CWL file format specification.
Completion files can be installed in a user's home folder under the ~/.kde/share/apps/kile/complete/<mode>/
subdirectory, where <mode>
either stands for abbreviation
, dictionary
or tex
.

This wizard has already been described in the section QuickStart Wizard.

The Include Graphics dialog makes insertion of graphics as easy as possible. You can reach it via the menubar with → . Please take a look at Graphic File Formats and EPS Graphics to get an overview of some basic facts concerning graphic formats.

Choose a graphics file. This can be a JPEG, PNG, PDF, EPS or even a zipped or gzipped EPS file. If you have installed ImageMagick and also configured Kile to use it ( → → +Graphics), the width and the height of the graphic is automatically shown. If ImageMagick can determine a resolution, the size of the graphics is also shown in centimeters.
Decide whether your image shall be centered on the page.
Choose whether you want the
\graphicspath
notation for your graphics file.By default graphics files have to be in the same folder as your master document. However, it is possible to put them in other folders to make things tidier. Without a
\graphicspath
command, Kile would include the path for the graphics file. But if you use\graphicspath
in your preamble like this:\graphicspath{{/path/to/my/graphics}{other/path/to/more/graphics}}
and check this option, Kile will only use the base name of the graphics file.
Another example: if you set
\graphicspath
command like:\graphicspath{{./}{camera/}{images/}}
LATEX will search in the current folder, then in
camera
and finally inimages
to find your graphics file.If you choose either a width or a height, the whole graphics will be proportionally scaled. If you set two values for width and height at the same time, width and height may be scaled with different factors, and this could not be what you want. See also the information near the top of the dialog to know the original size of the graphics.
Insert an angle by which to rotate the graphics counterclockwise.
The bounding-box information is set automatically when you choose a graphics file. This information is only needed when you work with traditional LATEX and bitmapped graphics. See the discussion of EPS graphics.
If LATEX needs a bounding box and you do not want to generate a bb file, Kile supports this option. On the other hand, PDFLATEX will give a warning when you want to include a png or jpg graphics with this option. This checkbox enables or disables the bounding-box option.
Scale the image by the desired scale factor. e.g., 0.5 to reduce by half, or 2 to double. When you use this option, you do not have to set a width or height for the image.
In the Trim Image tab you can crop your image in all four directions.
Finally, you have to specify whether you want to embed this image into a figure environment. When you want the text to wrap around the figure, use the wrapfigure environment instead.
Note
When you choose the wrapfigure environment, you need to include the wrapfig package in your preamble.
In either case you can insert a caption and a label for your image. Generally, it is a good idea to add a different prefix to each kind of label. It is common to use the prefix
fig:
for images.If you pick the figure environment, you can choose where LATEX should preferably position the figure.
In the wrapfigure environment you can:
Pick a placement rule for the figure and decide whether the figure should float or not. In a two-sided document you can define whether the figure should be on the inside or outside edge of the page.
Define how many shortened lines of the text are set alongside the figure. If you leave this empty, LATEX will determine this itself as well as is possible.
Define an overhang to the chosen side. This is especially useful when you have columns in your document and you want a figure to span over more than just one column or you want shortened text on both sides of the figure.
Choose a width for the figure. This should be a bit bigger than the actual image width, so there will be some empty space between the figure and the text.

One of the most boring jobs one can do in LATEX is to write a matrix or a tabular environment. One has to keep track of all the elements, ensure that the environment is well formed, and that all things are where they are supposed to be. Good indentation helps, but there is a simpler way: using Kile's → or → menu entries. You will then have a matrix-style input form that you can easily fill in with your entries. This dialog also offers some options to typeset the tabular material.

Using the toolbar on top of the dialog you can set the align
of a cell, define a certain font style
,
join
and split
cells, choose a border
, and specify background and font
colors
.
On the extreme right there is a Paste button. With this button you can insert a table
from the clipboard into the dialog, which allows you to copy and paste tables from a spreadsheet program, for example.
Below you can choose how many rows and columns you want, and you can tweak some more details about your array:
With the Name option you can select which environment should be used for your array or tabular material.
You can select the vertical cell alignment with the Parameter option. This is only enabled for environments which support that feature.
If it exists for the selected environment, you can select use starred version. When you select this option, you also have to specify a table width.
Tables sometimes look nicer when you select the use booktabs package option.
Of course, you can also Center your whole array.
Inserting bullets helps you when you want to fill in your content in the editor. With this option checked, Kile will insert bullet placeholders for each element of your array.
The → option will display a simpler dialog to quickly set up a tabbing environment. It allows you to easily specify the number of rows or columns and the required spacing.

Kile helps you with inserting your floating elements. With the → wizard it is very simple to create a new figure or table environment.

To insert a new floating environment just follow these steps:
Choose whether you want to insert a figure or a table.
Select the desired positioning rules.
Enter a caption for your floating element.
Type in a label for your new floating element. Kile will automatically suggest an appropriate prefix , e.g. "fig:" for figures and "tab:" for tables.

Remembering how all the different math elements work can be really annoying. Of course Kile can do the magic for you here: →

Options:
Name: Choose the type of math element you want to create.
Without numbering: This can switch numbering off for numbered elements like equations or aligns.
Space command to separate groups: In an environment which supports several groups like alignat, you can define a space separator when you have more than one group. You can enter any space command here, which exists in mathmode, e.g. \quad.
Standard tabulator: Select the tabulator which should be used. Kile should automatically pick the right one for you here.
Displaymath mode: For environments like matrices or arrays you can choose which math environment your mathematical text should be displayed with.
Use bullets: With this option checked, Kile will insert bullet placeholders for each element of your mathematical text.

PS files are not so popular as PDF files, but are an excellent base for manipulations and rearrangements of pages. If you need PDF output, you can rearrange pages with some PostScript® utilities and then convert it to PDF with ps2pdf.
The PostScript® Wizard under → will suggest the most
popular rearrangement. The conversion is done
by the programs pstops and psselect, which
can be found in most distributions in the package psutils
.
If one of these programs is not available, the corresponding item will not
be visible.

First choose your input file. If Kile finds a PS file corresponding to your current master document, it is already filled in as the input file, but you are also free to choose another file. Then choose an output file, and select one of the tasks. Finally, you have to decide whether you want to do the conversion only, or also invoke Okular to view the result.
- 1 A5 page + empty page --> A4
Combine one A5 page together with one empty page on one A4 page. Whenever two A5 pages are combined together, they are rotated 90 degrees and will be arranged on an A4 page in landscape mode.
- 1 A5 page + duplicate --> A4
Put one A5 page and a duplicate together on one A4 page.
- 2 A5 pages --> A4
Put two consecutive A5 pages together on one A4 page.
- 2 A5L pages --> A4
Put two consecutive A5 pages in landscape mode together on one A4 page.
- 4 A5 pages --> A4
Combine four consecutive A5 pages together on one A4 page. The A5 pages have to be scaled with factor 0.7 to fit on the page.
- 1 A4 page + empty page --> A4
Combine one A4 page together with one empty page on one A4 page. Whenever two A4 pages are combined together on one resulting A4 page, they have to be scaled with factor 0.7 and will be arranged in landscape mode.
- 1 A4 page + duplicate --> A4
Put one A4 page and a duplicate together on one A4 page.
- 2 A4 pages --> A4
Put two consecutive A4 pages together on one A4 page.
- 2 A4L pages --> A4
Put two consecutive A4 pages in landscape mode together on one A4 page.
- select even pages
Select all even pages of a document.
- select odd pages
Select all odd pages of a document.
- select even pages (reverse order)
Select all even pages of a document and reverse the order.
- select odd pages (reverse order)
Select all odd pages of a document and reverse the order.
- reverse all pages
Reverse all pages of a document.
- copy all pages (sorted)
Copy all pages of a document. You have to choose the number of sorted copies.
- copy all pages (unsorted)
Copy all pages of a document. You have to choose the number of non-sorted copies.
- pstops: choose parameter
There are many options for PostScript® utilities pstops and psselect. If you need a very special one, you can invoke pstops with an option of your choice. Please read the manual for all possible options.
- psselect: choose parameter
You can invoke psselect with an option of your choice. Please read the manual for all possible options.

Many people think of PDFs as frozen files, which cannot be modified. But this is not true, as there exist excellent tools
for manipulations and rearrangements of pages
to read and update document info
to read, set or change some permissions
of an existing PDF document.
Kile's PDF wizard under → uses two different methods to manipulate and rearrange PDF documents:
LATEX package pdfpages, which is part of each LATEX distribution. pdfpages doesn't work with encrypted pages.
pdftk, which is an excellent command line tool for doing everyday things with PDF documents (see The PDF Toolkit).
If one of these helpers, pdfpages or pdftk, is not present in your system, the corresponding items will not be visible. Furthermore, remember that only pdftk can work with encrypted files.
If Kile's PDF wizard is called, it starts with the Rearrangements
register card.

First choose your input file. If Kile finds a PDF file corresponding to your current master document, it will already be filled in as the input file, but you are also free to choose another file. Then choose an output file or overwrite the existing PDF file, and select one of the tasks. Finally, you have to decide whether you want to do the conversion only, or also invoke the viewer (e.g. Okular) to show the resulting document.
If the PDF file is encrypted, only pdftk will work and you have to give the password of this document to execute tasks.
- 1 page + empty page --> A4
Combine one page together with an empty page on one A4 page. Whenever two A5 pages are combined together, they are rotated by 90 degrees and arranged on an A4 page in landscape mode.
Whenever two A4 pages are combined together, they are scaled, rotated by 90 degrees and arranged on an A4 page in landscape mode.
- 1 page + duplicate --> A4
Put one page and a duplicate together on one A4 page.
If the page to be duplicated has A4 size, it will be scaled to fit on the page.
- 2 pages --> A4
Combine two consecutive pages together on one A4 page. Whenever two A5 pages are combined together, they are rotated by 90 degrees and arranged on an A4 page in landscape mode.
Whenever two A4 pages are combined together, they are scaled, rotated by 90 degrees and arranged on an A4 page in landscape mode.
- 2 pages (landscape) --> A4
Put two consecutive pages in landscape mode together on one A4 page.
- 4 pages --> A4
Combine four consecutive pages together on one A4 page. The pages have to be scaled to fit on the page.
- 4 pages (landscape) --> A4
Combine four consecutive pages in landscape mode together on one A4 page. The pages have to be scaled to fit on the page.
- select even pages
Select all even pages of a document.
- select odd pages
Select all odd pages of a document.
- select even pages (reverse order)
Select all even pages of a document and reverse the order.
- select odd pages (reverse order)
Select all odd pages of a document and reverse the order.
- reverse all pages
Reverse all pages of a document.
- decrypt a file
If the PDF file is encrypted, you can decrypt it.
- select pages
Add a comma separated list of pages or page ranges, e.g. 1,4-7,9. Only these pages will appear in the resulting PDF file.
- delete pages
Add a comma separated list of pages or page ranges, which should be removed from the chosen PDF file.
- apply a background watermark
Applies a PDF watermark to the background of a single input PDF. The wizard only uses the first page from the background PDF and applies it to every page of the input PDF. This page is scaled and rotated as needed to fit the input page.
- apply a background color
Applies a background color to all pages of the current document. This can only be done once, as the second color will be put behind the first color and will not then be visible.
- apply a foreground stamp
Applies a foreground stamp on top of the input PDF document's pages. The wizard uses only the first page from the stamp PDF and applies it to every page of the input PDF. This page is scaled and rotated as needed to fit the input page. This works best if the stamp PDF page has a transparent background.
- pdftk: choose parameter
You can invoke pdftk with an option of your choice. Please read the manual for all possible options.
- pdfpages: choose parameter
You can invoke pdfpages with an option of your choice. Please read the manual for all possible options.
The setting, changing and removing of properties will only be possible if pdftk is installed and if additionally Kile was compiled with the libpoppler
library.

Traditional PDF metadata includes the document's title, author, subject, keywords, creator, producer and the dates of creation and last modification.
Also, the setting, changing and removing of permissions will be only possible if pdftk is installed.

A password is necessary to set or change these document settings. Additionally, PDF encryption is done to lock the file's content behind this password or to enforce lighter restrictions imposed by the author. So the author can allow or restrict:
printing pages
modifying pages
copying text and graphics from pages
changing or adding annotations
filling form fields with data.
Changing permissions always forces encryption associated with 128-bit security of Acrobat
5 and 6, and also needs a password.
But always remember: encryption and a password do not provide any real PDF security. The content is encrypted, but the key is known. You should see it more as a polite but firm request to respect the author's wishes.

The statistics dialog in → gives you a statistical overview for a selection, a document or a whole project. It includes the number of words, LATEX commands/environments and also includes the number of characters for each type.
The statistics obtained can be copied as text or as a nicely formatted LATEX table to the clipboard.
When you select a text and open the statistics dialog, you get the statistics for the currently selected text. If you open the dialog without any text selected, the statistics for all opened files are shown. If you want to get statistics for the whole project, you can use → for an easy and quick way to open all source files of your project.
A note of caution has to be sounded about the accuracy of the numbers. We have included some logic to get a good estimate, e.g. K\"uhler gives one word and one command, with six and two characters respectively. But there are other combinations in which parts of commands are counted as words and vice versa. Please note that the algorithm was developed and tested for languages similar to English or German. So don't take the numbers for granted. If you write a report whose length has to be of a certain numbers of words or characters, please make some tests first in order to check whether Kile's accuracy satisfies your needs.

LATEX has thousands of tags for symbols and special characters. The easiest way to insert these tags is to use the sidebar menu, to the left of the editor window.

The Sidebar Menu
The following types are available:
Most Frequently Used
Relation
Operators
Arrows
Miscellaneous Math
Miscellaneous Text
Delimiters
Greek
Special Characters
Cyrillic Characters
User Defined
The tooltips of the icons show the LATEX commands and additionally needed packages.
Pressing Shift and clicking a symbol will result in
$\symbolcmd$
being inserted. Similarly, pressing Ctrl
inserts it in curly brackets.
If you insert a command which requires a package which is not included in your LATEX document, you will see a warning message in the logview window.
The first list of symbols holds the Most Frequently Used symbols. Inserted symbols will be added to this list, for quick and easy reference. The ordering of the symbols will not be changed upon addition of new symbols, instead a reference counter is incremented. If the number of items exceeds 30 items, the item with the lowest count is removed.
The User Defined symbol list can hold your own symbols.
To create your own symbols you need the program gesymb and the file definitions.tex
from the kile source package.
Additionally you need a LATEX compiler (what a surprise) and
dvipng (version 1.7 or later).
The procedure is that you create a LATEX file with \input{definitions}
,
which makes the commands listed below available, and let gesymb mysymbols.tex user
(which calls LATEX and dvipng) create the icons. After copying them to
$HOME/.kde/share/apps/kile/mathsymbols/user/
and restarting kile you can use your own symbols.
The following commands are defined in definitions.tex
:
\command[\optarg]{\symbol}
: Include the symbol\symbol
in the symbol list, the optional argument\optarg
specifies the command which kile should insert. If it is not given the command in the mandatory argument is used.\mathcommand[\optarg]{\symbol}
: Same as above, except that the command in the mandatory argument is inserted in math mode.\pkgs[arg]{pkg}
: Declare that the command given in this line needs the LATEX packagepkg
with the optional argumentarg
. This command has to be in front of the\command
command and overrides any package specification by the neededpkgs enviroment.\begin{neededpkgs}[pkgs-args]{pkgs} ... \end{neededpkgs}
: Has the same effect as above, but for all enclosed commands.
An example for completeness is given here:
\documentclass[a4paper,10pt]{article} \usepackage{amssymb} \input{definitions} % \begin{document} \pagestyle{empty} % \begin{neededpkgs}{amssymb} \mathcommand{\surd} \pkgs{amsmath}\mathcommand[\ddddot{}]{\ddddot{a}} \mathcommand{\angle} \end{neededpkgs} \command{\"A} \mathcommand{\exists} \mathcommand[\stackrel{}{}]{\stackrel{abc}{=}} %\begin{neededpkgs}[russian,koi8-r,T2C,]{babel,inputenc,fontenc,mathtext} % % \end{neededpkgs} % this would need to include the packages % \usepackage{mathtext} % \usepackage[T2C]{fontenc} % \usepackage[russian]{babel} % \usepackage[koi8-r]{inputenc} % just to explain the format \end{document}

\bibitem
is a command used to enter a reference in a
thebibliography
environment in your document. The syntax for using
\bibitem
is \bibitem[label]{key}
.
The optional [label]
is for you to add your own
labeling system for the bibliography entry. If no label is set, the entries
will be set in numerical order: [1], [2], [3], etc.
The argument {key}
is used to reference and link the commands
\bibitem
and \cite
to
each other and the information they contain. The command \cite
contains the
label associated with the intended \bibitem
, which is located inside a
thebibliography
environment, and contains the reference data.
Both corresponding \bibitem
and \cite
must
have the same {key}
; the easiest way to organize keys is by
the author's last name. The secondary braces in the thebibliography
environment denote the longest bibliography label you expect to have.
So, inserting {
means
you can have any label shorter or as large as the expression
foo
}
. Failure to set this parameter correctly
may result in a not so attractive indentation of your bibliography.foo
The bibliography is a section apart from your main document, and an example of code for the bibliography would look like the following:
\begin{thebibliography}{50} \bibitem{Simpson} Homer J. Simpson. \textsl{Mmmmm...donuts}. Evergreen Terrace Printing Co., Springfield, SomewhereUSA, 1998 \end{thebibliography}
Then, your main source code would contain the location of the information relating to
the \bibitem
using \cite
. That source code would look similar to this:
My thesis, about the philosophy of The Simpsons\copyright comes from my favorite book \cite{Simpson}.
As it is often difficult to remember the exact citation key once you have many
references, Kile provides an easy way to insert a citation. Using → →
a list with all the citation keys pops up. Select the correct
reference and a citation will be inserted into your document. To update the list of keys,
either save the file, or → , or press F12.
With code completion enabled, Kile will show you a list of all the bibitem
-labels
as soon as you open up a \cite
command.
The final result in your document's bibliography would then look like this:
[1] Homer J. Simpson. Mmmmm...donuts. Evergreen Terrace Printing Co.,
Springfield, SomewhereUSA, 1998.
Kile can also work together with BibTEX editors, such as KBibTEX to make it easier to enter citations. When a BibTEX file is added to the project, Kile will help you complete citation commands, just as described above.

Kile supports a user-configurable menu, which will appear as a part of Kile's menu. This menu can be configured using Kile's configuration dialog with → → .

You have two options where to place this menu:
either the menu will appear in the main menu bar between the menus and and the configuration wizard in the menu
or both items will appear at the bottom of the menu.
Already existing user-defined tags from older versions of Kile are automatically transformed into the new user-configurable menu. The tags are saved in a file called usertags.xml
and like all menu definition files, they can be found in the local user menu directory of Kile: KILE_APP_DIR/usermenu/
, e.g. /home/user/.kde/share/apps/kile/usermenu/
.
You can use different menu definition files for different tasks. Call the user menu wizard → or → to install or edit a menu definition file.

You can create new or change existing menus with a comfortable user menu configuration wizard found at → .

On the left side you will see an existing menu-tree. Like a standard menu, three different kinds of menu items are available:
standard menu entries, which are assigned to an action
submenus, which contain more menu items
separators, to get a visible structure of all entries.
To modify this menu, use the six buttons on the left side. More possible actions are available in the context menu of already existing menu items.

Each standard menu item is assigned to one of three action types, where each of them has different attributes, which could be set:
Text: Kile gives you the ability to make your own tags. A tag is similar to a shortcut that launches some command or writes frequently-used texts, e.g. Joe Sixpack often uses the sentences
Hi, I have been inserted ...
. This tag will be inserted at the current cursor position, when this action is called (see above). Metachars are also available (see Placeholders).Insert file contents: Inserts the complete contents of a given file.
Execute an external program: The output of this program can be inserted into the opened document. Metachar
%M
is also possible in the command line of this program, as the selected text will be saved in a temporary file. Use%M
for the filename of this temporary file.
If some important information for an action is missing, menu items are colored red. This may be a nonexisting file

or a missing title for the menu entry, which will be shown with question marks as ???
.

If you open the context menu of such a red colored menu item, you will get an additional option for more information concerning this error.

More information may also be available using the What's this feature of most widgets.

There are some placeholders you can use in your user-defined tags: %C
, %B
, %M
, %E
, %R
and %T
.
%C
: this is where the cursor will be placed after the insertion of a user-defined tag.%B
: will be replaced by a bullet (see Bullets).%M
: will be replaced by the selected text.%E
: denotes the indentation depth of text inside an environment.%R
: will call a reference-dialog to choose a label which has already been defined. This can be used to refer to a predefined label, which you can choose from a drop-down list (see also → → or → → ).%T
: will call a citation-dialog to choose an already defined citation. The same as using → → a list with all the citation keys pops up.
Let's consider another example, with the following macro \frac{%M}{%C}
. First, we select a number in our text, let's say 42
.
Now we invoke this macro and obtain \frac{42}{}
with the cursor located within the second pair of brackets.
If you want to insert the contents of a text file, you could use the same placeholders.
If you want to execute an external program, only the %M
for selected text is recognized in the command line. The selection will be saved in a temporary file and the placeholder %M
is replaced with this filename.

Another placeholder is %S
, which is replaced by the complete base name of the current document without the path. This base name consists of all characters in the file up to (but not including) the last '.' character.

Most menu entries may have additional self-explaining parameters, which may be checked. If some of these parameters are not available for some kind of action, they are disabled.

Here is one example for executing an external program:

You can see that a perl
script is called, which should work with current selection. The Needs selected text parameter is checked to assure a selection. The output of this script will be inserted (Insert the output of the chosen program) and replace the current selection (Replace selected text), but not selected itself.
Of course you can also call your own programs or scripts. For example select a list of numbers, separated by spaces, and call a script or Perl program, which transforms this selection into LATEX code for a matrix. Whatever your ideas may be, you can realize them using the following usermenu entry.


You can install different menus at runtime for different tasks. When you call the user menu wizard, the current menu definition file is loaded. If you modify it and close the dialog with , your changes will be saved and installed as the new user menu. Closing the dialog with will discard all changes.

You are also free to save the modified file in the user menu directory or to load another menu definition file and install it. All user menu definition files must be saved in the local user menu directory of Kile: KILE_APP_DIR/usermenu/
.
Look at the example menu definition file example.xml
to see more menu entries with their parameters.

To view the result of your work, you first need to compile the source. All the build tools are grouped closely together in the → , → , and → menus.
To compile your source code for screen viewers like Okular or further conversion, you can use the shortcut Alt+2. Then you can view the DVI file using your default viewer with Alt+3, convert the DVI to a PS file with Alt+4, and view the PS file with Alt+5.
If you are using BibTEX for your bibliography entries, you usually have to follow a special compiling scheme. This means calling LATEX and then BibTEX and then LATEX twice again. Fortunately Kile is clever enough to detect automatically if it is necessary to call additional tools like BibTEX, makeidx and Asymptote. This logic is turned on by default and can be changed in → → +Build in the General tab in the LATEX and PDFLATEX tools.
If you want to compile your document with MetaPost or Asymptote, picture drawing programs, you can do it with → → , or → → .
There is also another way to compile your document, if you want a PDF: you can run PDFLATEX, that will compile the source directly into a PDF file, with Alt+6: you can then view the compiled file by pressing Alt+7.
Alternatively, you can convert a PS into a PDF with Alt+8, or a DVI directly into a PDF with Alt+9.
Using PDFLATEX instead of LATEX may be just a matter of simplicity or habit, but sometimes the behavior of the two programs can differ.
Finally, you may want to publish your work on the web and not just on paper. You may then use the latex2html program, that can be called from Kile's menu → → . The result will be placed in a subfolder of the work folder, and you will be able to see the result of the conversion choosing the menu item → → .

You will always need some time to view the result, when working with LATEX. LATEX has to compile the source and the viewer has to be called. This can be annoying if you only changed some letters in an equation difficult to typeset. Kile offers a Quick Preview mode, where you can compile only a part of a document and save a lot of time. It supports four different modes, which can be combined with seven configurations.

All settings must be done in → → +Preview.

The user has to select a part of the document. Menu entry → → or the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Alt+P,S will start the selected programs. Kile takes the preamble of the original text, so that all packages and user defined commands are included. The user can choose one of eight predefined configurations:
LaTeX+DVI (embedded viewer)
LaTeX+DVI (Okular)
LaTeX+PS (embedded viewer)
LaTeX+PS (Okular)
PDFLaTeX+PDF (embedded viewer)
PDFLaTeX+PDF (Okular)
XeLaTeX+PDF (embedded viewer)
XeLaTeX+PDF (Okular)
This should be sufficient for all situations for which a quick preview is needed.
Very often you want to preview the current environment, and especially mathematical environments, which sometimes may be difficult to write. Kile offers a very fast way to do this. No selection is needed, just choose → → or the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Alt+P,E and the current environment will be compiled and shown.
If you have a large project with a lot of documents, compiling the whole project is not a great idea, if you have made changes only in one single document. Kile is able to compile and show a preview of the current subdocument. It takes the preamble from the master document and only compiles the current part when you choose → → or the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Alt+P,D.
The mathgroup preview mode allows you to preview the mathgroup you are currently editing. Kile takes the preamble from the master document and only compiles the mathgroup the cursor is currently in when you choose → → or the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Alt+P,M.

PDFLATEX, when used with graphics
or
graphicx
packages, can correctly compile PNG and JPG files into
DVI or PDF, but is not able to handle EPS files. Conversely, the process of compiling
with LATEX to DVI and converting to PS and eventually PDF does support EPS, but does
not support PNG and JPG.
A lot of users want to create PDF documents, but also want to use the excellent Pstricks package to create PostScript® graphics, or they want to use the PostScript® output of mathematical and scientific software like Mathematica, Maple or MuPAD. These LATEX users have to compile first in PostScript®, even if they want to create PDF documents, because these programs produce PostScript® code which cannot be managed by PDFLATEX. However, it is not so hard as it may sound, because Kile will help.
To overcome this frustrating loop, when you want to include both PostScript® code and PNG or JPG files, you have a number of workarounds:
If you need a file in PS format, but have JPG or PNG graphics, you can also simply use PDFLATEX with DVI output first, and then run dvips to create the PS file. You see that PDFLATEX is a very good choice, if your source contains no PostScript® code at all.
You can convert EPS files to PNG or other formats with utilities as the Gimp or ImageMagick and use PDFLATEX.
A preferred way is to convert EPS graphics to PDF graphics with epstopdf, which comes with every TEX distribution and then use PDFLATEX. It produces high quality graphics, and you can even control the result with some of the following options:
-dAutoFilterColorImages=false -dAutoFilterGrayImages=false -sColorImageFilter=FlateEncode -sGrayImageFilter=FlateEncode -dPDFSETTINGS=/prepress -dUseFlateCompression=true
Even better: if your system allows
shell-escape
, conversion can be done on the fly. All you have to do is to include the epstopdf package, which is part of all TEX distributions, with the command\usepackage{epstopdf}
. Assuming that your code is:\includegraphics[width=5cm]{test.eps}
When you call PDFLATEX with option
--shell-escape
, graphicstest.eps
is automatically converted intotest.pdf
.This conversion will take place each time you run PDFLATEX. If your graphics command is given implicitly:
\includegraphics[width=5cm]{test}
epstopdf checks whether
test.pdf
is already available, so that the conversion step can be skipped.You can convert the other way around, and use LATEX and PS-PDF conversion. This is not always a good idea, since EPS encapsulation of JPG or PNG can yield larger files, that in turn yield unnecessarily large documents. This is however highly dependent on the graphic utility that you use, since EPS can encapsulate other graphics, but not all applications support this perfectly. Some might actually try to build your JPG image with vectors and various scripting, which will result in gigantic files. Conversion of all graphics formats to EPS can be done by ImageMagick. Another simple program that does this process correctly is jpg2ps.
You can also use an automatic conversion. All graphics files are converted on the fly to EPS, and inserted into the PS document. This is a comfortable way, but you have to set up your system properly. This is discussed in the section EPS Graphics.
EPS is sort of a graphic vector scripting language, describing all the lines and dots the graphic is made of; it looks good even when magnified beyond its default size, and suits best diagrams and vectorial graphics natively produced in EPS, which look very clear and sharp while maintaining a very small byte size.
PNG (or the deprecated GIF) is a non-lossy file format, with good compression and quality. It is very good for diagrams, scans of drawings, or anything whose sharpness you do want to retain. It is sometimes overkill when used for photos.
JPG is a lossy format, that compresses files better than PNG at the price of some loss in the picture detail. This is usually irrelevant for photos, but may cause bad quality for diagrams, drawings, and may make some thin lines disappear outright; in those cases use EPS or PNG.
But always remember: garbage in, garbage out! No conversion will make a bad picture good.

EPS graphics files are the traditional way to insert graphics files into LATEX documents. As mailing lists are full with questions concerning EPS graphics, we will discuss some important aspects and demonstrate how Kile supports them.
If you decided to use the traditional LATEX to produce PS or PDF output, you will probably run into some problems with graphics. You have to use EPS graphics (Encapsulated PostScript®); no JPEG or PNG files. This should be no problem, as there are a lot of converters like convert from the excellent ImageMagick package. But, it needs some time of course.
The EPS files are used by both LATEX and the DVI-PS converter:
LATEX scans the EPS file for the bounding-box line, which tells LATEX how much space to reserve for the graphics.
The DVI-PS converter then reads the EPS file and inserts the graphics in the PS file.
This has some implications:
LATEX never reads the EPS file if the bounding-box parameters are specified in the graphics insertion command.
Since LATEX cannot read non-ASCII files, it cannot read the bounding-box information from compressed or non-EPS graphics files.
The EPS graphics are not included in the DVI file. Since the EPS files must be present when the DVI file is converted to PS, the EPS files must accompany the DVI files whenever they are moved.
Now you can call LATEX, and a DVI-PS converter like dvips
to create your PostScript® document. If your goal is a PDF document, you should run
dvips with option -Ppdf
and then call
ps2pdf. You will find a lot of documents describing this solution.
Kile helps you to get the bounding-box information. If you have installed ImageMagick package, Kile will extract this information from the EPS file and insert it as an option. This is done automatically when you select the graphics file. There are two advantages to proceeding like this:
The information is already scanned in the dialog, and need not to be done by LATEX later on.
Even more important is that the width and height of the picture can be calculated, when the resolution is known. This information will be shown near the top of the dialog, and may serve as a clue when you want to scale the graphics.
Kile can also support zipped or gzipped EPS files, which are much smaller than uncompressed EPS files. But, this feature can only be used with a special system setup and a change of your local graphics configuration, as it is described in the Bitmap Graphics section.
If your system allows shell-escape
, Kile
also supports an easy way to include bitmap graphics, if you set up your TEX
system properly. There is no need to convert JPEG or PNG graphics,
this can be done automatically when the DVI file is converted to PS.
LATEX needs some information about the file suffixes. The package
graphicx
looks for a file graphics.cfg
,
which must be somewhere in your search path for LATEX documents. Search for
entries like:
\DeclareGraphicsRule{.pz}{eps}{.bb}{}% \DeclareGraphicsRule{.eps.Z}{eps}{.eps.bb}{}% \DeclareGraphicsRule{.ps.Z}{eps}{.ps.bb}{}% \DeclareGraphicsRule{.ps.gz}{eps}{.ps.bb}{}% \DeclareGraphicsRule{.eps.gz}{eps}{.eps.bb}{}%
and replace these lines with:
\DeclareGraphicsRule{.pz}{eps}{.bb}{}% \DeclareGraphicsRule{.eps.Z}{eps}{.eps.bb}{}% \DeclareGraphicsRule{.ps.Z}{eps}{.ps.bb}{}% \DeclareGraphicsRule{.ps.gz}{eps}{.ps.bb}{}% % changed or new graphic rules \DeclareGraphicsRule{.eps.zip}{eps}{.eps.bb}{`unzip -p #1}% zipped EPS \DeclareGraphicsRule{.eps.gz}{eps}{.eps.bb}{`gunzip -c #1}% gzipped EPS \DeclareGraphicsRule{.jpg}{eps}{}{`convert #1 eps:-}% JPEG \DeclareGraphicsRule{.gif}{eps}{.bb}{`convert #1 eps:-}% GIF \DeclareGraphicsRule{.png}{eps}{.bb}{`convert #1 eps:-}% PNG \DeclareGraphicsRule{.tif}{eps}{.bb}{`convert #1 eps:-}% TIFF \DeclareGraphicsRule{.pdf}{eps}{.bb}{`convert #1 eps:-}% PDF-graphics
You will find this file, for example in Debian, at
/etc/texmf/latex/graphics.cfg
. The best way to proceed is to copy this
file to your local texpath and then change this copy. See your TEX distribution manual
to learn how to get a list of your TEX folders.
With this configuration file you are able to insert bitmap graphics and zipped or gzipped EPS files in LATEX. The command for conversion is given by dvips. When you look at the conversion command you will see that no extra file is created. The result of the conversion process is directly piped into the PS file. The only thing LATEX must know is the size of the graphics, and therefore we need the bounding box, which is provided by Kile.
Some say that this way is insecure; you have to decide on how to work. In any case, you need no bounding box, as Kile will extract this information from all types of graphics.
As already stated, PDFLATEX is not able to handle EPS graphic files,
but converters like epstopdf
will help. The best way is to include package epstopdf
,
which must follow the graphicx
package.
\usepackage[pdftex]{graphicx} \usepackage{epstopdf}
Now you can already include EPS graphics, if you run pdflatex
with option --shell-escape
, but we can make it even better
and also handle zipped or gzipped EPS files. Again we have to change
the graphics configuration file graphics.cfg
as above.
This time we search for:
% pdfTeX is running in pdf mode \ExecuteOptions{pdftex}%
and simply add some lines:
% pdfTeX is running in pdf mode \ExecuteOptions{pdftex}% \AtEndOfPackage{% \g@addto@macro\Gin@extensions{.eps.gz,.eps.zip}% \@namedef{Gin@rule@.eps.gz}#1{{pdf}{.pdf}{`gunzip -c #1 | epstopdf -f >\Gin@base.pdf}}% \@namedef{Gin@rule@.eps.zip}#1{{pdf}{.pdf}{`unzip -p #1 | epstopdf -f >\Gin@base.pdf}}% }%
With these lines, PDFLATEX is able to handle EPS files, and hopefully there should be no more issues concerning graphics.

Defining your document as a master allows you to work with separate files, which gives you a parent document (or Master document), and child documents that make up a complete work. After having defined your Master document, with the corresponding command in the menu, all the commands of the menu will apply only to this document, even when you are working on the child documents. You can even close the Master document.

After you have compiled something, Kile takes a look at the error messages that were generated. If there are any errors or warnings, they will be briefly reported in the Log and Messages window. One can take a closer look at the messages by selecting → , or by using the keyboard shortcut Alt+0. The generated log is then displayed in the Log and Messages view; errors and warnings are highlighted.

Viewing the log
You can easily jump from one message in the log file to another by using the → menu items, or by using the corresponding toolbar buttons.
To jump to the line in the LATEX source where the error or warning occurred, click on the error or warning in the Log and Messages view. Kile will take you automatically to the offending line.

When you launch the command, a viewer of some sort will normally be called after the compilation. If you are not using an embedded viewer, a new window will be opened every time.
If you are adjusting the look of your document, you might launch very often, and have many viewer windows open on your desktop; to avoid this confusion, you can activate the mode, that will prevent from launching a viewer.
This mode is of course useless with the embedded viewers, as you have to close them anyway to get back to editing the document and recompiling.

The Structure view shows the hierarchy of the document being created in Kile, and allows you to quickly navigate it, showing its segmentation. To navigate around your document, all you need to do is to left click on any label, chapter, section, subsection, etc., and you will be taken to the beginning of the corresponding area.
If you included a separate LATEX file in your source using
the \input
or \include
tags, these files will
be referred to in the Structure view; double-clicking on their names
will make Kile bring up the included file in the editor window.
The hierarchy tree also has a separate branch for labels used in the text.
Most of the entries in the structure view have a lot of entries in the context menu, which you can open with a right mouse click. So look at the structure view in the following picture.

You will find some labels, some sectioning entries, two figure environments and three pictures. If you right click on one of the sectioning entries, a menu with some useful commands will popup. All commands like , or will work with all lines, which belong to this section.

Clicking on a figure or table entry will offer some actions with respect to references and a right click on a graphics entry will offer some programs to open the graphics.


Bookmarks are your reference to a segment of text or a line inside the Kile environment. To use a bookmark, select a specific line of your document you would like to return to, then press Ctrl+B, and Kile will add a bookmark to this line. Alternatively, you can also set a bookmark by highlighting a line and choosing the menu labeled → .
To remove all your bookmarks, select → .

In Kile you can create and work with projects. A project is a
group of LATEX, graphic, BibTEX, or other files that contain all the information that is used to build
your complete document. A typical project would be a document consisting of several chapters,
written in different .tex
files; all of them could be included in
a project, to make the whole document easier to manage. The specifications of the project are stored in a special file,
with extension .kilepr
.
A Project adds the following functionalities:
You need not set a master document, Kile does this automatically.
Project files can easily be archived together by going to →
The Files and Projects view shows which files are included in the project.
After opening a project, any file that was previously opened will be restored with the original encoding and highlighting.
Code completion works across all project files.
Reference completion works across all project files.
Citation completion works across all project files.
Search in all project files.
Specify custom quickbuild and makeidx command.
You can find all project related commands in the Project-menu. From there you can open, close and manage your projects.

To create a project, select → .

You will be asked to give the following information to create your project:
Title of your project (Project title text field).
The title of the project will be used to create a name of the project file by transforming to lowercase and adding
.kilepr
extension.A folder where the project file will be stored (Project folder text field).
If you want to create a new main file of the project check the Create a new file and add it to this project item.
When you fill out the Filename box, you have to include a relative path from where the
.kilepr
project file is stored (see the Project folder item).Type of the created file, Empty File, Article, Book, Letter, Report, etc. can be chosen from a visual list at the bottom of the File panel.
Extensions for the default files in the project can be selected using the Extensions panel. Your choice will be used to define the files that should be opened when you choose → menu item and in the Kile wizards. The extensions in the text field should be separated with spaces.

The Files and Projects view is a button of the sidebar menu.
From this view, you can see the structure of your project, its files,
and the name of the .kilepr
file that stores the project information.
Adding, removing, or changing options in your project is done via
the Files and Projects view.

The Files and Projects View

To add a file to your project, open any TEX file, right click on its name in the Files and Projects view, and select Add to Project. If you have opened multiple projects, a dialog box will pop up in which you can specify to which project the file should be added.
You can also right-click on the project's name in the Files and Projects view, and select Add Files... to bring up a file selection dialog.

Adding a file to a project
To remove a file from a project, right-click on it and select Remove File.
This does not delete your file (and also does not close it), but only removes it from the list
of files contained in the .kilepr
extension.
Kile allows you to easily backup your project by storing all its files into a single archive (often known as a tarball). To archive your project, right-click on its name in the Files and Projects view, or select → .
By default, all files in a project are added to the archive. If you do not want to include a certain file in the archive, right-click on it in the Files and Projects view, and uncheck the Include in Archive option.
The archive operation is currently realized by executing the tar from the project
folder (where the .kilepr
file is located).

Kile has a few options related to your project that can be set. To change them, right-click on the title of your project and select Project Options, and you will have the option of changing:
The title of your project.
Default file extensions.
The Master document.
The Quickbuild command.
The makeidx options.


The Kile editor allows you to read, convert and save text in the character encoding your document needs. With this it is possible, for example, to use accented characters, such as are commonly used in Italian or French, directly in LATEX documents. Selecting the encoding for your document can be done in two ways:
One way to set the document encoding is by using the submenu → → , where you can set the default character encoding for all files.
A second way to set the encoding for a document is to choose the desired encoding within the wizard to create a new document.
LATEX itself only understands ASCII, which represents a very limited set of characters. Hence, it is not possible to use
accented characters directly. To use them nevertheless, a special syntax was invented:
such as for example \"e
for ë
.
The inputenc package is available to help you with this. It is included
in the preamble using \usepackage[latin1]{inputenc}
, where the optional argument
specifies the encoding you would like to use (nowadays in most cases utf8
). This tells LATEX
to translate all of the ë
's you wrote to \"e
's before
compiling. Please refer to the inputenc documentation directly for more
information. Last but not least: remember to make sure that your file is actually saved
in the same encoding you specified for the inputenc package!
This multitude of different character coding tables has created numerous problems: for example,
you cannot write a course of Turkish in French without losing one language's special characters.
There is general agreement that, sooner or later,
everybody will switch to Unicode. There
are many implementations of Unicode, and UTF-8 is the most
successful in Linux®; Windows®(R) relies instead on the more cumbersome and
less flexible UCS-2. Most distributions have already
begun setting their default encoding to UTF-8, and therefore you
may be very interested in using the utf8
argument to the
inputenc
package.
If you don't have the ucs package installed, you can proceed as follows:
Get the ucs package from CTAN.
To install it, unpack the downloaded file and place it in a folder listed in your $
TEXINPUTS
environment variable. This can also be set inside Kile.
\usepackage{ucs} \usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}

Adding support for ideographic languages is quite tricky. However, once you are done with it, it will work quite well. Other than installing packages, there is some extra configuration work to do.
Tip
Your Linux® distribution might already have a CJK (Chinese, Japanese, Korean) package ready for you, so you might be saved the hassle of manually installing everything. Do check before going forward!
There is the possibility of using the ucs package in order to write short snippets of CJK text, but that option is seriously limited as it does not handle, among other things, newlines. Instead, we will install the complete CJK-LATEX package and make it work for both LATEX and PDFLATEX. A lot of this material has been inspired by Pai H. Chou's page about how to setup PDFLATEX.
Download the CJK package. Copy its unpacked files to an appropriate subfolder of $
TEXMF
, just as you did with the ucs package before (see The ucs Package). The files will be unpacked in aCJK/X_Y.Z
folder; it is not important that you take them out, though it will probably be tidier and easier for you to maintain.Now you have to download a font that supports all the CJK characters you need. You can choose any
*.ttf
file that covers them, but in this walkthrough we will use Cyberbit. Unzip the file and renameCyberbit.ttf
tocyberbit.ttf
, since uppercase might confuse your system.Place
cyberbit.ttf
in a folder together withUnicode.sfd
, and generate the*.tfm
and*.enc
files with the command$ ttf2tfm cyberbit.ttf -w cyberbit@Unicode@
. For some reason, sometimes this does not produce the hundreds of files it should. Should that happen in your case, you can download both*.tfm
and*.enc
files.Place the
*.tfm
files in an appropriate folder, say$
; theTEXMF
/fonts/tfm/bitstream/cyberbit/*.enc
files may be installed in$
.TEXMF
/pdftex/enc/cyberbit/Now we need a map file to connect the
*.enc
files to the font. Downloadcyberbit.map
and install it in$
.TEXMF
/pdftex/config/Download another file,
c70cyberbit.fd
, and place it in an appropriate folder. You may choose, for example,$
.TEXMF
/tex/misc/The last file we have to generate is a PostScript® Type 1 font, necessary to read DVI files generated with LATEX. Run the command
$ ttf2pfb cyberbit.ttf -o cyberbit.pfb
, and copy the resultingcyberbit.pfb
to a folder such as$
.TEXMF
/fonts/type1/cyberbit/Let's now place
cyberbit.ttf
among the fonts where LATEX can find it. You could place it in a folder named$
.TEXMF
/fonts/truetype/Check the configuration file you find at
$
, and make sure that the line mentioningTEXMF
/web2c/texmf.cnfTTFONTS
is uncommented and points to the folder where you savedcyberbit.ttf
.To make it possible for PDFLATEX to use your CJK fonts, it is necessary that you add a line in the configuration file
$
. AddTEXMF
/pdftex/config/pdftex.cfgmap +cyberbit.map
in the file to complete the configuration for PDFLATEX.To configure LATEX so that you can produce DVI files with CJK characters, you have to add a line in file
ttfonts.map
. The file might be in a folder named$
, but you will probably have to look for it. Append the lineTEXMF
/ttf2pk/cyberbit@Unicode@ cyberbit.ttf
to it.Now, you only have to run
texhash
and the system should be ready.
To test whether your configuration is correct, you can try to compile this test file.
There are many things that can go wrong when adding CJK support manually. If something seems not to work, the following checklist might help you.
Obviously, since you run LATEX as a user and not as root, you must allow ordinary users to access the new files. Make sure all folders and files are accessible using the chmod command.
If LATEX writes a DVI without problems, but you cannot view it, it is almost certainly because of some problems in the automatic generation of
*.pk
fonts. They are supposed to be generated on the fly when viewing a DVI file, but this might fail for a number of reasons: double-checkttfonts.map
for your custom line first. However, it might happen that your ttf2pk command, which is usually invoked by the DVI viewer, has been compiled without support for the kpathsea libraries. If this is the case,ttf2pk
will make no mention of kpathsea. As support for these libraries is necessary, you might have to find a new package, or recompile FreeType 1 yourself.--version
There are a number of different input engines, and the choice can
depend also on personal preference. The author uses Skim,
a port to KDE of the Scim
engine. Refer to your distribution's documentation to learn how to
install these programs. Configuration of such programs can be tricky
too, in the case of Skim you will have to
define an environment variable
before starting X.XMODIFIERS
="@im=SCIM"

Kile's scripting feature allows the execution of ECMAScript code, widely known as JavaScript. You will find a lot of tutorials, which provide information about objects (variables), functions and properties supported by JavaScript.
Scripting support can be enabled in the configuration dialog of Kile: → → +Scripting.

If scripting is enabled, an additional scripting panel is visible in the sidebar, where scripts can be managed:

This widget contains six icons, which offer different tasks:
Run the selected script.
Create a new script.
Open the selected script in the editor.
Configure a key sequence for the selected script.
Remove an assigned key sequence.
Refresh the list of available scripts, which are all found in
$
.KDEDIR
/share/apps/kile/scripts/

You can execute a script in three different ways:
Select the desired script and click on the Execute button on the left side of the script management widget.
Use a keyboard shortcut.
You can assign a keyboard shortcut to a script using the Configure button in the script management widget.
Use an editor key sequence. The script will be executed, if you type the assigned key sequence in the editor.
This method can be extended to a rather sophisticated kind of code completion. Let us assume that you have a written a script, which simply inserts the LATEX command
\textbf{}
into the current document.document.insertText("\\textbf{%C}");
If you now type the assigned key sequence
bfx
in your text document, this key sequence will be removed and the script will be executed. It will insert\textbf{}
and the cursor is placed between the braces.What a comfortable and powerful method of code completion.

The scripting API presented here is available in all scripts. Before the contents of a script is loaded, Kile first adds several prototypes and functions to the scripting context. This convenience API contains prototypes like text cursors and text ranges and is located in the folder KILE_APP_DIR/script-plugins/
.
Kile scripts differ slightly from Kate scripts, which use another design, as they also can be started from the command line. But all functions of the Kate scripting API are also available in Kile's scripting API, so porting JavaScript code from Kate to Kile should be very easy. But as Kile is a very rich featured LATEX editor, its own scripting API offers many more possibilities than Kate's one.
Remark: Description of API calls, which are also available in Kate scripting, have been taken from Kate's documentation.
This section lists global functions.
void debug(
String
);text
Prints
text
tostdout
in the console. The printed text is colored to distinguish it from other debug output.
As Kile is a text editor, all the scripting API is based on cursors and ranges whenever possible. A Cursor is a simple (line, column)
tuple representing a text position in the document.
Cursor();
Constructor: Returns a Cursor at position
(0,0)
.Example:
var cursor = new Cursor();
Cursor(
int
,line
int
);column
Constructor: Returns a Cursor at position (line,column).
Example:
var cursor = new Cursor(3,42);
Cursor(
Cursor
);other
Copy constructor: Returns a copy of the cursor
other
.Example:
var copy = new Cursor(other);
Cursor Cursor.clone();
Returns a clone of the cursor.
Example:
var clone = cursor.clone();
bool Cursor.isValid();
Check whether the cursor is valid. The cursor is invalid if line and/or column are set to
-1
.Example:
var valid = cursor.isValid();
Cursor Cursor.invalid();
Returns a new invalid cursor located at
(-1,-1)
.Example:
var invalidCursor = cursor.invalid();
int Cursor.compareTo(
Cursor
);other
Compares this cursor to the cursor
other
. Returns-1
, if this cursor is located before the cursorother
,0
, if both cursors equal and+1
, if this cursor is located after the cursorother
.
bool Cursor.equals(
Cursor
);other
Returns
true
, if this cursor and the cursorother
are equal, otherwisefalse
.
String Cursor.toString();
Returns the cursor as a string of the form
Cursor(line,column)
.
As Kile is a text editor, all the scripting API is based on cursors and ranges whenever possible. As Cursor is a simple (line, column)
tuple representing a text position in the document, a Range spans text from a starting cursor position to an ending cursor position.
Range();
Constructor: Calling
new Range()
returns a Range at(0,0) - (0,0)
.
Range(
Cursor
,start
Cursor
);end
Constructor: Calling
new Range(
returns the range from cursorstart
,end
)start
to cursorend
.
Range(
int
,startLine
int
,startColumn
int
,endLine
int
);endColumn
Constructor: Calling
new Range(
returns the Range from (startLine
,startColumn
,endLine
,endColumn
)startLine
,startColumn
) to (endLine
,endColumn
).
Range(
Range
);other
Copy constructor: Returns a copy of Range
other
.
Range Range.clone();
Returns a clone of the range.
Example:
var clone = range.clone();
bool Range.isValid();
Returns
true
, if both start and end cursor are valid, otherwisefalse
.Example:
var valid = range.isValid();
bool Range.invalid();
Returns the Range from (-1,-1) to (-1,-1).
bool Range.contains(
Cursor
);cursor
Returns
true
, if this range contains the cursor position, otherwisefalse
.
bool Range.contains(
Range
);other
Returns
true
, if this range contains the Rangeother
, otherwisefalse
.
bool Range.containsColumn(
int
);column
Returns
true
, ifcolumn
is in the half open interval[start.column, end.column]
, otherwisefalse
.
bool Range.containsLine(
int
);line
Returns
true
, ifline
is in the half open interval[start.line, end.line]
, otherwisefalse
.
bool Range.overlaps(
Range
);other
Returns
true
, if this range and the rangeother
share a common region, otherwisefalse
.
bool Range.overlapsLine(
int
);line
Returns
true
, ifline
is in the interval[start.line, end.line]
, otherwisefalse
.
bool Range.overlapsColumn(
int
);column
Returns
true
, ifcolumn
is in the interval[start.column, end.column]
, otherwisefalse
.
bool Range.equals(
Range
);other
Returns
true
, if this range and the Rangeother
are equal, otherwisefalse
.
String Range.toString();
Returns the range as a string of the form
Range(Cursor(line,column) - Cursor(line,column))
.
Whenever a script is being executed, there is a global object (variable) view
representing the current active editor view. All functions of view
work with cursor positions or selected text. The following is a list of all available view
functions.
void view.backspace();
Programmatically performs the equivalent of pressing the backspace key.
Cursor view.cursorPosition();
Returns the current cursor position in the view.
void view.setCursorPosition(
int
,line
int
); void view.setCursorPosition(column
Cursor
);cursor
Set the current cursor position to either
line
,column
or to the givencursor
.
void view.cursorLeft();
Moves the cursor one position backward in the text.
void view.cursorRight();
Moves the cursor one position forward in the text.
void view.cursorUp();
Moves the cursor one line up in the document.
void view.cursorDown();
Moves the cursor one line down in the document.
int view.cursorLine();
Returns the line which the cursor is currently located at.
int view.cursorColumn();
Returns the column which the cursor is currently located at.
void view.setCursorLine(
int
);line
Set the cursor line to the given
line
.
void view.setCursorColumn(
int
);column
Set the cursor column to the given
column
.
Cursor view.virtualCursorPosition();
Get the current virtual cursor position. Virtual means the tabulator character (TAB) counts multiple characters, as configured by the user (e.g. one TAB is 8 spaces). The virtual cursor position provides access to the user visible values of the current cursor position.
bool view.hasSelection();
Returns
true
, if the view has selected text, otherwisefalse
.
String view.selectedText();
Returns the selected text. If no text is selected, the returned string is empty.
Range view.selectionRange();
Returns the selected text range. The returned range is invalid if there is no selected text.
void view.setSelection(
Range
);range
Set the selected text to the given
range
.
void view.selectAll();
Selects the entire text in the document.
void view.clearSelection();
Clears the text selection without removing the text.
void view.removeSelectedText();
Remove the selected text. If the view does not have any selected text, this does nothing.
void view.selectLine();
Selects the text in the current line.
void view.selectLine(
int
);line
Selects the text in the given
line
.
void view.selectLines(
int
,from
int
);to
Selects the entire text from line
from
to lineto
.
void view.selectWord();
Selects the current word. If no word is found at the current cursor position, nothing is done.
void view.selectLatexCommand();
Selects the current LATEX command. If no command is found at the current cursor position, nothing is done.
void view.selectEnvironment(
bool
);inside = false
Selects the entire text of the current LATEX environment. If
inside
isfalse
, the environment text including the surrounding LATEX tags\begin{...}...\end{...}
will be selected, else without these tags. If no parameter is given,inside
is set tofalse
.
void view.selectTexgroup(
bool
);inside = true
Selects the text of the current LATEX group. If
inside
istrue
, only the texgroup without the surrounding braces will be selected. If no parameter is given,inside
is set totrue
.
void view.selectMathgroup();
Selects the text of the current math group.
void view.selectParagraph(bool wholeLines = true);
Selects the entire text of the current LATEX paragraph. If
wholeLines
istrue
, the first and the last lines of the paragraph will be included in the selection entirely (including the end-of-line character); otherwise, the selection will only contain non-whitespace characters.
Whenever a script is being executed, there is a global object (variable) document
representing the current active document. The following is a list of all available document
functions.
void document.insertText(
String
);text
Inserts the
text
at the current cursor position.
void document.insertText(
int
,line
int
,column
String
); void document.insertText(text
Cursor
,cursor
String
);text
Inserts the
text
at the given cursor position.
bool document.removeText(
int
,fromLine
int
,fromColumn
int
,toLine
int
); bool document.removeText(toColumn
Cursor
,from
Cursor
); bool document.removeText(to
Range
);range
Removes the text in the given range. Returns
true
on success, orfalse
, if the document is in read-only mode.
bool document.replaceText(
Range
,range
String
);text
Replace the text of the given range with the specified text.
int document.lines();
Returns the number of lines in the document.
int document.length();
Returns the number of characters in the document.
Range document.documentRange();
Returns a range which encompasses the whole document.
Cursor document.documentEnd();
Returns the current cursor position of the document's end.
String document.text();
Returns the entire content of the document in a single text string. Newlines are marked with the newline character
\n
.
String document.text(
int
,fromLine
int
,fromColumn
int
,toLine
int
); String document.text(toColumn
Cursor
,from
Cursor
); String document.text(to
Range
);range
Returns the text in the given range. It is recommended to use the cursor and range based version for better readability of the source code.
bool document.setText(
String
);text
Sets the entire document text.
bool document.clear();
Removes the entire text in the document.
String document.line();
Returns the current text line as string.
String document.line(
int
);line
Returns the given text line as string. The string is empty if the requested line is out of range.
int document.lineLength();
Returns the length of the current line.
int document.lineLength(
int
);line
Returns the
line
's length.
bool document.insertLine(
String
);s
Inserts text in the current line. Returns
true
on success, orfalse
, if the document is in read-only mode or the line is not in the document range.
bool document.insertLine(
int
,line
String
);s
Inserts text in the given line. Returns
true
on success, orfalse
, if the document is in read-only mode or the line is not in the document range.
bool document.removeLine();
Removes the current text line. Returns
true
on success, orfalse
, if the document is in read-only mode.
bool document.removeLine(
int
);line
Removes the given text line. Returns
true
on success, orfalse
, if the document is in read-only mode or the line is not in the document range.
bool document.replaceLine(
String
);text
Replace the text of the current line with the specified text.
bool document.replaceLine(
int
,line
String
);text
Replace the text of the given line with the specified text.
bool document.truncateLine();
Truncate the current line at the given column or cursor position. Returns
true
on success, orfalse
if the given line is not part of the document range.
bool document.truncate(
int
,line
int
); bool document.truncate(column
Cursor
);cursor
Truncate the given line at the given column or cursor position. Returns
true
on success, orfalse
if the given line is not part of the document range.
String document.word();
Returns the word at the current cursor position. If no word is found at this cursor position, the returned string is empty.
String document.wordAt(
int
,line
int
); String document.wordAt(column
Cursor
);cursor
Returns the word at the given cursor position. If no word is found at this cursor position, the returned string is empty.
Range document.wordRange();
Returns the range of the word at the given cursor position. If no word is found,
Range.invalid()
is returned, which can be tested withRange.isValid()
.
String document.latexCommand();
Returns the LATEX command at the current cursor position. If no command is found at this cursor position, the returned string is empty.
String document.latexCommandAt(
int
,line
int
); String document.latexCommandAt(column
Cursor
);cursor
Returns the LATEX command at the given cursor position. If no command is found at this cursor position, the returned string is empty.
Range document.latexCommandRange();
Returns the range of the LATEX command at the given cursor position. If no LATEX command is found,
Range.invalid()
is returned, which can be tested withRange.isValid()
.
String document.charAt(
int
,line
int
); String document.charAt(column
Cursor
);cursor
Returns the character at the given cursor position.
String document.firstChar(
int
);line
Returns the first character in the given
line
that is not a whitespace. The first character is at column 0. If the line is empty or only contains whitespace characters, the returned string is empty.
String document.lastChar(
int
);line
Returns the last character in the given
line
that is not a whitespace. If the line is empty or only contains whitespace characters, the returned string is empty.
bool document.isSpace(
int
,line
int
); bool document.isSpace(column
Cursor
);cursor
Returns
true
, if the character at the given cursor position is a whitespace, otherwisefalse
.
void document.insertBullet();
Insert a Kile bullet. Remember that you can easily jump to the next or previous bullet. This will also highlight this bullet so that it will be deleted automatically, when you enter your first letter.
void document.nextBullet();
Jump to the next bullet in the text if there is one.
void document.previousBullet();
Jump to the previous bullet in the text if there is one.
bool document.hasEnvironment();
Returns
true
if a surrounding LATEX environment is found, elsefalse
.
String document.environment(
bool
);inside = false
Returns the entire text of the surrounding LATEX environment. If
inside
isfalse
, the environment text including the surrounding LATEX tags\begin{...}...\end{...}
will be returned, else without these tags. If no parameter is given,inside
is set tofalse
. If no environment is found, the returned string is empty.
Range document.environmentRange(
bool
);inside = false
Returns the range of the surrounding LATEX environment. If
inside
isfalse
, the range including the surrounding LATEX tags\begin{...}...\end{...}
will be returned, else without these tags. If no parameter is given,inside
is set tofalse
. If no environment is found,Range.invalid()
is returned, which can be tested withRange.isValid()
.
String document.environmentName();
Returns the name of the surrounding LATEX environment or an empty string.
void document.removeEnvironment(
bool
);inside = false
Removes the text of the surrounding LATEX environment. If
inside
isfalse
, the environment text including the surrounding LATEX tags\begin{...}...\end{...}
will be removed, else without these tags. If no parameter is given,inside
is set tofalse
.
void document.closeEnvironment();
Insert a closing environment tag, if an opened LATEX environment is found at the current cursor position.
void document.closeAllEnvironments();
Insert closing environment tags for all opened LATEX environments, which were found at the current cursor position.
bool document.hasTexgroup();
Returns
true
if a surrounding LATEX group is found at the current cursor position, elsefalse
.
String document.texgroup(
bool
);inside = true
Returns the text of the surrounding LATEX group. If
inside
isfalse
, the text of this LATEX group including the surrounding braces{...}
will be returned, else without them. If no parameter is given,inside
is set tofalse
. The returned string is empty, if no surrounding LATEX group is found at the current cursor position.
Range document.texgroupRange(
bool
);inside = true
Returns the range of the surrounding LATEX group. If
inside
isfalse
, the range including the surrounding braces{...}
will be returned, else without them. If no parameter is given,inside
is set tofalse
. If no group is found,Range.invalid()
is returned, which can be tested withRange.isValid()
.
void document.removeTexgroup(
bool
);inside = true
Removes the text of the surrounding LATEX group. If
inside
isfalse
, the text of this LATEX group including the surrounding braces{...}
will be removed, else without them. If no parameter is given,inside
is set tofalse
.
bool document.hasMathgroup();
Returns
true
if a surrounding LATEX mathgroup is found at the current cursor position, elsefalse
.
String document.mathgroup();
Returns the text of the surrounding LATEX mathgroup. The returned string is empty, if no surrounding LATEX mathgroup is found at the current cursor position.
Range document.mathgroupRange();
Returns the range of the surrounding LATEX mathgroup. If there is no surrounding mathgroup,
Range.invalid()
is returned, which can be tested withRange.isValid()
.
void document.removeMathgroup();
Removes the text of the surrounding LATEX mathgroup.
String document.paragraph();
Returns the text of the current LATEX paragraph.
Range document.paragraphRange();
Returns the range of the surrounding LATEX paragraph.
void document.removeParagraph();
Removes the text of the current LATEX paragraph.
bool document.matchesAt(
int
,line
int
,column
String
); bool document.matchesAt(text
Cursor
,cursor
String
);text
Returns
true
, if the giventext
matches at the corresponding cursor position, otherwisefalse
.
bool document.startsWith(
int
,line
String
,pattern
bool
);skipWhiteSpaces = true
Returns
true
, if the line starts withpattern
, otherwisefalse
. The argumentskipWhiteSpaces
controls whether leading whitespaces are ignored.
bool document.endsWith(
int
,line
String
,pattern
bool
);skipWhiteSpaces = true
Returns
true
, if the line ends withpattern
, otherwisefalse
. The argumentskipWhiteSpaces
controls whether trailing whitespaces are ignored.
int document.firstColumn(
int
);line
Returns the first non-whitespace column in the given
line
. If there are only whitespaces in the line, the return value is-1
.
int document.lastColumn(
int
);line
Returns the last non-whitespace column in the given
line
. If there are only whitespaces in the line, the return value is-1
.
int document.prevNonSpaceColumn(
int
,line
int
); int document.prevNonSpaceColumn(column
Cursor
);cursor
Returns the column with a non-whitespace character starting at the given cursor position and searching backwards.
int document.nextNonSpaceColumn(
int
,line
int
); int document.nextNonSpaceColumn(column
Cursor
);cursor
Returns the column with a non-whitespace character starting at the given cursor position and searching forwards.
int document.prevNonEmptyLine(
int
);line
Returns the next non-empty line containing non-whitespace characters searching backwards.
int document.nextNonEmptyLine(
int
);line
Returns the next non-empty line containing non-whitespace characters searching forwards.
void document.gotoBeginEnv();
Go to the start of a surrounding LATEX environment.
void document.gotoEndEnv();
Go to the end of a surrounding LATEX environment.
void document.gotoBeginTexgroup();
Go to the start of a surrounding LATEX group.
void document.gotoEndTexgroup();
Go to the end of a surrounding LATEX group.
void document.gotoNextParagraph();
Go to the next LATEX paragraph.
void document.gotoPrevParagraph();
Go to the previous LATEX paragraph.
void document.gotoNextSectioning();
Go to the next LATEX section.
void document.gotoPrevSectioning();
Go to the previous LATEX section.
void document.gotoLine(
int
);line
Go to the given
line
.
void document.insertChapter();
Insert a
\chapter
command (see alsodocument.insertSection()
).
void document.insertSection();
Insert a
\section
command. As with choosing the menu entry → → a dialog will appear, where you can choose the title and an optional label for this sectioning command.
void document.insertSubsection();
Insert a
\subsection
command (see alsodocument.insertSection()
).
void document.insertSubsubsection();
Insert a
\subsubsection
command (see alsodocument.insertSection()
).
void document.insertParagraph();
Insert a
\paragraph
command (see alsodocument.insertSection()
).
void document.insertSubparagraph();
Insert a
\subparagraph
command (see alsodocument.insertSection()
).
void document.insertLabel();
Insert a
\label
command.
void document.insertReference();
Insert a
\ref
command. As with choosing the menu entry → → a dialog will appear, where you can choose from already defined labels, which are listed in a combobox.
void document.insertPageref();
Insert a
\pageref
command (see alsodocument.insertReference()
).
void document.insertCitation();
Insert a
\cite
command.
void document.insertIndex();
Insert a
\index
command.
void document.insertFootnote();
Insert a
\footnote
command.
void document.comment();
Inserts comment markers to make the selection or current line a comment.
void document.uncomment();
Removes comment markers from the selection or current line.
void document.uppercase();
Put the selected text or the letter after the cursor in uppercase.
void document.lowercase();
Put the selected text or the letter after the cursor in lowercase.
void document.capitalize();
Capitalize the selected text or the current word.
void document.joinLines();
Joins the lines of the current selection. Two succeeding text lines are always separated with a single space.
void document.insertIntelligentNewline();
Insert a smart newline (see Smart Newline).
void document.insertIntelligentTabulator();
Insert a smart tabulator (see Smart Tabulator).
void document.editBegin();
Starts an edit group for undo/redo grouping. Make sure to always call
editEnd()
as often as you calleditBegin()
. CallingeditBegin()
internally uses a reference counter, i.e., this call can be nested.
void document.editEnd();
Ends an edit group. The last call of
editEnd()
(i.e. the one for the first call ofeditBegin()
) finishes the edit step.
StringList document.labelList();
Returns all defined labels as a
StringList
, which can be used in JavaScript as an array of strings.
StringList document.bibitemList();
Returns all defined bibitems as a
StringList
, which can be used in JavaScript as an array of strings.
void document.refreshStructure();
Refresh the structure view (see Navigating the LATEX Source).
The global object (variable) kile
is used to handle top level interactions with the outside world, input message and dialog interfaces. These API calls are divided into subobjects to structure this part of the scripting API. Conceptually kile
is a bit like window
in a browser API.
kile.alert
: message boxeskile.input
: get user inputkile.wizard
: call one of Kile's wizardskile.script
: get info about a running scriptkile.file
: file operations like read and write.
void kile.alert.information(
String
,text
String
);caption
Display an Information dialog.
text
is the message string andcaption
the title of the message box. The default title is the script name.
void kile.alert.sorry(
String
,text
String
);caption
Display a Sorry dialog.
text
is the message string andcaption
the title of the message box. The default title is the script name.
void kile.alert.error(
String
,text
String
);caption
Display an Error dialog.
text
is the message string andcaption
the title of the message box. The default title is the script name.
String kile.alert.question(
String
,text
String
);caption
Display a simple question dialog.
text
is the message string andcaption
the title of the message box. The default title is the script name. The returned string is eitheryes
orno
.
String kile.alert.warning(
String
,text
String
);caption
Display a simple warning dialog.
text
is the message string andcaption
the title of the message box. The default title is the script name. The returned string is eithercontinue
orcancel
.
String kile.input.getListboxItem(
String
,caption
String
,label
StringList
);list
Function to let the user select an item from a list, which is shown as a listbox.
caption
is the text that is displayed in the title bar,label
is the text that appears as the label for the list andlist
is the string list which is inserted into the list.
String kile.input.getComboboxItem(
String
,caption
String
,label
StringList
);list
Function to let the user select an item from a list, which is shown as a combobox.
caption
is the text that is displayed in the title bar,label
is the text that appears as the label for the list andlist
is the string list which is inserted into the list.
String kile.input.getText(
String
,caption
String
);label
Function to get a string from the user.
caption
is the text that is displayed in the title bar andlabel
the text that appears as a label for the line edit.
String kile.input.getLatexCommand(
String
,caption
String
);label
Function to get a LATEX command from the user. This means that only lower- and uppercase letters are allowed.
caption
is the text that is displayed in the title bar andlabel
the text that appears as a label for the line edit.
int kile.input.getInteger(
String
,caption
String
,label
int
,min = INT_MIN
int
);max = INT_MAX
Function to get an integer from the user.
caption
is the text that is displayed in the title bar.label
is the text that appears as the label for the spin box.min
andmax
are the minimum and maximum allowable values the user may choose. Default values areINT_MIN
andINT_MAX
.
int kile.input.getPosInteger(
String
,caption
String
,label
int
,min = 1
int
);max = INT_MAX
Function to get a positive integer from the user.
caption
is the text that is displayed in the title bar.label
is the text that appears as the label for the spin box.min
andmax
are the minimum and maximum allowable values the user may choose. Default values are1
andINT_MAX
.
void kile.wizard.tabular();
Calls the Tabular wizard, which helps to write a tabular environment (see Arrays and tabulars).
void kile.wizard.array();
Calls the Array wizard, which helps to write an array environment (see Arrays and tabulars).
void kile.wizard.tabbing();
Calls the Tabbing wizard, which helps to write a tabbing environment (see Arrays and tabulars).
void kile.wizard.floatEnvironment();
Calls the Floats wizard, which helps to insert floating elements (see Inserting floating elements).
void kile.wizard.mathEnvironment();
Calls the Math wizard, which helps to insert math environments (see Inserting Math environments).
void kile.wizard.postscript();
Calls the Postscript Tools wizard, which may help to manipulate or rearrange Postscript documents (see PostScript® Utilities).
String kile.script.name();
Returns the basename of a running script (without path and extension).
String kile.script.caption();
Returns a string, which can be used as a caption of alert boxes. It looks like
Script: scriptname.js
.
Object kile.file.read(
String
);filename
Read the contents of a text file. It is used like
Example:
var res = kile.file.read("path/to/file.txt");
The return value
res
is an object (better: a map) with three properties:status: Gives the status code of the operation, which can be 0 (no error), 1 (access failed) or 2 (access denied). So, if no error occurred, the value of
res.status
orres["status"]
will be 0.result: Contains the text of the given file.
message: Contains an error message, if an error occurred.
Object kile.file.read();
The same as
read(filename)
, but no filename is given. A dialog will appear to select the file to read.
Object kile.file.write(
String
,filename
String
);text
Write the given text into a file. It is used like
Example:
var res = kile.file.write("path/to/file.txt","Some text...");
The return value
res
is an object (better: a map) with two properties:status
andmessage
(seeread()
for more information).
Object kile.file.write(
String
);text
The same as
write(filename,text)
, but no filename is given. A dialog will appear to choose a filename.
String kile.file.getOpenFileName(
String
,startDir
String
);filter
Creates a modal file dialog and return the selected filename or an empty string if none is chosen. Note that with this method the user must select an existing filename.
Parameters:
startDir: Starting directory of the open dialog.
filter: A shell glob or a mime-type-filter that specifies which files to display. Refer to the KFileDialog documentation for more information on this parameter.
Both parameters are optional. If you omit
filter
, all files will be displayed. If additionallystartDir
is omitted, the dialog will take the current document directory as starting point.
String kile.file.getSaveFileName(
String
,startDir
String
);filter
Creates a modal file dialog and returns the selected filename or an empty string if none is chosen. Note that with this method the user need not select an existing filename. See
getOpenFileName()
for an explanation of the parameters.

Some examples may help you to understand how to use the scripting API. These examples and some more are found in the scripting directory of Kile: KILE_APP_DIR/scripts/
. Each script contains a short description.
Replace a surrounding LATEX environment with another, where the relative cursor position will not be changed. \begin{abc}...\end{abc}
for example can be changed to \begin{xyz}...\end{xyz}
.
var range = document.environmentRange(false); if ( range.isValid() ) { var envname = kile.input.getLatexCommand("Enter Environment","New environment name:"); if ( envname != '' ) { replaceEnvCommand(envname,range); } } else { kile.alert.sorry("No surrounding LaTeX environment found."); } function replaceEnvCommand(newEnv,r) { var c = view.cursorPosition(); var envname = document.environmentName(); if ( envname != "" ) { var beginRange = new Range(r.start,new Cursor(r.start.line,r.start.column+8+envname.length)); var endRange = new Range(new Cursor(r.end.line,r.end.column-6-envname.length),r.end); document.editBegin(); document.replaceText(endRange,"\\end{"+newEnv+"}"); document.replaceText(beginRange,"\\begin{"+newEnv+"}"); document.editEnd(); } }
Replace a surrounding LATEX font command with another font command, when the cursor is placed inside the texgroup. The relative cursor position will not be changed. \textbf{abc}
for example can be changed to \textit{abc}
.
var fontCommands = new Array("\\textbf","\\textit","\\textsl","\\texttt", "\\textsc","\\textrm","\\textsf","\\emph"); var range = document.texgroupRange(false); if ( range.isValid() ) { replaceFontCommand(range); } else { kile.alert.sorry("No surrounding TeX group found."); } function replaceFontCommand(r) { var c = view.cursorPosition(); document.editBegin(); view.setCursorPosition(r.start); var cmd = document.latexCommand(); var index = fontCommands.indexOf(cmd); if ( index >= 0 ) { var cmdRange = document.latexCommandRange(); if ( cmdRange.isValid() ) { var newcommand = kile.input.getListboxItem("Choose", "Choose font command:",buildCmdList(cmd)); if ( newcommand != "" ) { document.replaceText(cmdRange,newcommand); c.column = c.column - (cmd.length - newcommand.length); } } / view.setCursorPosition(c); } else { kile.alert.sorry("No surrounding font command found."); } document.editEnd(); } function buildCmdList(current) { var result = new Array(); for ( i=0; i<fontCommands.length; ++i ) { if ( fontCommands[i] != current ) { result.push(fontCommands[i]); } } return result; }
Surround selected text with a TeX command, where the relative cursor position will not be changed. abc
for example can be changed to \texcommand{abc}
.
var range = view.selectionRange(); if ( range.isValid() ) { var cmd = kile.input.getLatexCommand("Choose","Choose surrounding LaTeX command:"); if ( cmd != "" ) { surroundTexCommand("\\"+cmd,range); } } else { kile.alert.sorry("No selection found."); } function surroundTexCommand(cmd,r) { var c = view.cursorPosition(); document.editBegin(); view.clearSelection(); document.insertText(r.end,"}"); document.insertText(r.start,cmd+"{"); c.column = c.column + cmd.length + 2; view.setCursorPosition(c); document.editEnd(); }

LATEX is a rather sophisticated system, where basic features can be expanded by a great variety of additional packages. Kile provides numerous different ways to aid the user.
An alphabetical index of the most common LATEX commands.
teTEX/TeX Live ships with a huge number of help documents. This includes documentation for all the included packages and an additional LATEX reference.
A full reference for TEX and friends. This is not only a description of all programs, but some important packages are also mentioned. It also includes a full reference manual of LATEX commands—ideal for looking up a particular piece of formatting while writing a document. As this document is really extensive, it is referenced in Kile by three bookmarks.
Another alphabetical index of the most common LATEX commands.
A description of important LATEX subjects.
An alphabetical index of the most common LATEX environments.

It is not always easy to find the right document as teTEX/TeX Live ships with a huge number of help documents. In order to facilitate this process, teTEX/TeX Live provides a tiny program called texdoctk. It provides a database of all the help documents, for which Kile offers a user-friendly interface.

All the documents are grouped into categories. Additionally, one can search for package names or keywords. Kile will then show only the help documents matching the search string.

A mouse double-click or the Space key will start a viewer for the selected document. This can be an arbitrary document, not only a DVI, PS, PDF or HTML document. Kile takes the KDE settings into account in order to start an appropriate viewer.

Besides this static teTEX/TeX Live documentation, Kile also supports a more flexible variable way for help documents. In the menu Kile has a special submenu, where the user can add documents of his or her own choice. These can be the most important documents of the teTEX/TeX Live documentation, or even self-written documents. It is also possible to enter URLs.
Go to → → +Help and choose the button to configure this menu. You can add, remove or move menu entries around, and insert separators to optimize the structure of the menu.

Pressing the button will open another dialog, where you can edit the name of the menu entry, and choose the corresponding file or URL. The second button to the right of the text field launches Konqueror, which can be used to determine the correct URL.

After finishing the configuration, all the entries will appear in the menu of Kile as a special menu entry .


Kile is an open-source user-friendly LATEX / TEX source code editor. It runs on systems that have the KDE Desktop Environment installed. KDE is available for several architectures including Linux® and other Unix-like systems.
Many thanks are owed to the people who strive to continue the Kile project and to those who sacrifice numerous hours of their time to develop tools we can all use under the GNU license. Up-to-date information about contributors can be found in the dialog from the menu.
Many thanks to all those involved!
This documentation is licensed under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.
This program is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License.