latex-papersize 1.70

Change LaTeX paper size and margins to simulate any magnification

Calculate LaTeX paper and margin settings for arbitrary magnification (C) Silas S. Brown, 2005-2009, 2016, 2019-20, 2025-26. Version 1.7

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the ``License''); you may not use this file except in compliance with the License. You may obtain a copy of the License at

http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software distributed under the License is distributed on an ``AS IS'' BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied. See the License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations under the License.

Introduction

When producing enlarged material in LaTeX for people with low vision, it's often not enough to simply add such things as \Large because that doesn't enlarge everything and it can be difficult to achieve the exact desired size, especially if unusual packages are being used as well.

It's more effective to change the LaTeX paper size and margin settings to simulate small paper and then magnify the result up to the desired physical paper size. This magnifies everything, and also adds some clarity for low-vision users because fonts like Computer Modern Roman have different versions at different sizes and the small-sized versions are often meant to be clearer.

latex-papersize calculates the necessary settings for arbitrary font and page sizes. There are two ways to run it: a modern .sty that works in pdflatex, xelatex and lualatex, and a legacy Python script that works with pdflatex or plain old latex / dvips. The legacy Python script requires Python (works in both Python 2 and Python 3) but the .sty file can be used as-is.

Modern usage

In the following instructions, base-size is the point size that the TeX file is based on---quick reference: if the documentclass parameters say 12pt then (within 1%) \small=11 ormalsize=12 \large=14 \Large=17 \LARGE=20 \huge=25---and desired-size is the point size that you want to produce.

For the modern .sty file, simply use

\usepackage[basesize=12,desiredsize=26]{latex-papersize}

(The default is to enlarge from 10 point to 26 point, but you should ideally check with individual readers which point size they work with best.)

Other parameters are the dimensions paperwidth and paperheight (defaults to A4), marginleft and margintop (defaults to 10mm), and extrabottom for how much space to leave for page numbers at the bottom of each page: try extrabottom=15pt for plain pagestyle. If it is left at its default of 0, \pagestyle{empty} will be set automatically.

Legacy usage

If you need to use the legacy Python script, its command-line parameters depend on whether you are using latex/dvips or pdflatex. On most systems, you can begin by typing python -m latex_papersize. On some systems you will need to type python3 instead of python, and/or you may need to specify the full path of latex-papersize.py depending on your distribution. If you've installed it using pip, you can try python -m latex-papersize or python3 -m latex-papersize. You may also be able to copy latex-papersize.py to a directory on your PATH such as /usr/local/bin and then just type latex-papersize.

The instructions below assume you will be typing python -m latex_papersize but you should change this to suit your system as described in the above paragraph.

Legacy usage with latex and dvips

To print the geometry settings:

python -m latex_papersize base-size desired-size tex

e.g.: python -m latex_papersize 12 26 tex

The output of this command should then be placed after \documentclass in your .tex file.

Then run latex to make a DVI file, and then do:

python -m latex_papersize base-size desired-size dvi-file

e.g.: python -m latex_papersize 12 26 myfile.dvi

which will print the appropriate dvips command.

Legacy usage with pdflatex

It should no longer be necessary to use the Python script with pdflatex, since the modern .sty file is compatible with pdflatex. But if for some reason you need to use the Python script instead, you need only one command:

python -m latex_papersize base-size desired-size pdftex

the output of this command should go just before egin{document}. NB if using hyperref package, put hyperref after these settings (and if also using pinyin package then put pinyin package after that again)

Page numbers in legacy usage

When invoking latex-papersize.py with the tex or pdftex options, you can optionally add a fourth parameter to specify how many points to leave for page numbers at the bottom of each page. Normally 15 is a good idea. Leaving this out causes no room to be left for page numbers and \pagestyle{empty} to be added. This does not affect the dvips command.

Paper sizes and margins in legacy usage

It is assumed that the final physical printout will be on A4 portrait with 10mm margins. You can override this by setting the paper_width and paper_height environment variables (in millimetres) before running, e.g.: paper_width=297 paper_height=210 python -m latex_papersize ... You can also set the environment variables margin_left and margin_top (the right and bottom margins are assumed to be mirrors of these).

If using with non-PDF latex, remember to set the environment variables again when asking latex-papersize.py for the dvips command. Or ``export'' them so they remain set.

Poster printing

If you want to print on a physical paper size that is larger than your printer can handle, you can make up the larger size by sticking together smaller pieces of paper. Perhaps the best way to do this is to use a separate utility that knows about printable areas, cut margins, etc, such as Jos van Eijndhoven's poster utility at https://ctan.org/pkg/poster

In this case you can give latex-papersize.py a margin_left and margin_top of 0 (because poster will handle the margins), set the paper size and desired point size appropriate for the final poster, use latex/dvips, and run the resulting .ps through poster with -s 1. This is better than getting poster to scale, because if any of your fonts are rendered into bitmaps by Metafont (as some CJK fonts are) then you will likely get a better resolution if the final size is given to latex-papersize.py rather than to poster.

If you're aiming for a specific number of sheets of paper, don't pick a physical size that's an exact multiple of your printer's paper size, because poster accounts for unprintable areas and overlaps slightly. Multiply the printer paper's height and width by 0.88 (or 0.86 if you want a visual margin added to the finished poster besides the cutting margins) and try a multiple of that size.

Example legacy usage in a script

To typeset a LaTeX file file.tex and magnify from 12-point to 26-point, type a line such as the following (after adjusting the documentclass it specifies, and removing or commenting out the documentclass in file.tex):

latex "\documentclass[12pt]{article}$(python -m latex_papersize 12 26 tex)\input{file.tex}" && mv article.dvi file.dvi

Or in pdflatex (slightly more complex because we need to put the settings just before egin{document}): cat file.tex | awk -- "/^ *\\begin *\{document\}[^#-~]*\$/ { print \"$(python -m latex_papersize 12 26 pdftex | sed -e 's/\/\\/g')\" } { print }" > /tmp/tmp.tex then pdflatex "\documentclass[12pt]{article}\input{/tmp/tmp.tex}" && mv article.pdf file.pdf

To run dvips on the .dvi file (not needed for pdflatex):

$(python -m latex_papersize 12 26 file.dvi)

It is recommended to use the newer .sty file with a PDF backend instead of doing all this.

Where to find history

You shouldn't need this, but old versions of this utility (along with some non-LaTeX utilities for handling scans and reflowing documents for giant print) may be found on GitHub at https://github.com/ssb22/scan-reflow and on GitLab at https://gitlab.com/ssb22/scan-reflow and on BitBucket https://bitbucket.org/ssb22/scan-reflow and at https://gitlab.developers.cam.ac.uk/ssb22/scan-reflow and in China: https://gitee.com/ssb22/scan-reflow The current version is also on the author's home page at https://ssb22.user.srcf.net/notes/#latex