PyOverleaf

Unofficial Python API to access Overleaf.

Tasks

• List projects
• Download project as zip
• List and download individual files/docs
• Upload new files/docs
• Delete files, create folders
• Python CLI interface to access project files
• Move, rename files
• Create, delete, archive, and rename projects
• Access/update comments, perform live changes
• Access/update profile details
• Robust login

Getting started

Install the project by running the following:

pip install 'pyoverleaf'

Before using the API, make sure you are logged into Overleaf in your default web browser. Currently, only Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox are supported: https://github.com/borisbabic/browser_cookie3 Test if everything is working by listing the projects:

pyoverleaf ls

Python API

The low-level Python API provides a way to access Overleaf projects from Python. The main entrypoint is the class pyoverleaf.Api

Accessing projects

import pyoverleaf

api = pyoverleaf.Api()
api.login_from_browser()

# Lists the projects
projects = api.get_projects()

# Download the project as a zip
project_id = projects[0].id
api.download_project(project_id, "project.zip")

Managing project files

import pyoverleaf

api = pyoverleaf.Api()
api.login_from_browser()
# Choose a project
project_id = projects[0].id

# Get project files
root_folder = api.project_get_files(project_id)

# Create new folder
new_folder = api.project_create_folder(project_id, root_folder.id, "new-folder")

# Upload new file to the newly created folder
file_bytes = open("test-image.jpg", "rb").read()
new_file = api.project_upload_file(project_id, new_folder.id, "file-name.jpg", file_bytes)

# Delete newly added folder containing the file
api.project_delete_entity(project_id, new_folder)

Higher-level Python IO API

The higher-level Python IO API allows users to access the project files in a Pythonic way. The main entrypoint is the class pyoverleaf.ProjectIO

Here are some examples on how to use the API:

import pyoverleaf

api = pyoverleaf.Api()
api.login_from_browser()
# Choose a project
project_id = projects[0].id

# Get project IO API
io = pyoverleaf.ProjectIO(api, project_id)

# Check if a path exists
exists = io.exists("path/to/a/file/or/folder")

# Create a directory
io.mkdir("path/to/new/directory", parents=True, exist_ok=True)

# Listing a directory
for entity in io.listdir("path/to/a/directory"):
    print(entity.name)

# Reading a file
with io.open("path/to/a/file", "r") as f:
    print(f.read())

# Creating a new file
with io.open("path/to/a/new/file", "w+") as f:
    f.write("new content")

Using the CLI

The CLI provides a way to access Overleaf from the shell. To get started, run pyoverleaf --help to list available commands and their arguments. If you want to access your own Overleaf instance, you may set an environment variable PYOVERLEAF_HOST or specify it in each call appending --host HOST.

Listing projects and files

# Listing projects
pyoverleaf ls

# Listing projects of your own instance
pyoverleaf ls --host overleaf.my-host.com

# Listing project files
pyoverleaf ls project-name

# Listing project files in a folder
pyoverleaf ls project-name/path/to/files

Downloading existing projects

pyoverleaf download-project project-name output.zip

Creating and deleting directories

# Creating a new directory (including parents)
pyoverleaf mkdir -p project-name/path/to/new/directory

# Deleting
pyoverleaf rm project-name/path/to/new/directory

Reading and writing files

# Writing to a file
echo "new content" | pyoverleaf write project-name/path/to/file.txt

# Uploading an image
cat image.jpg | pyoverleaf write project-name/path/to/image.jpg

# Reading a file
pyoverleaf read project-name/path/to/file.txt