LuaTeX is a

TeX Tex, TeX, TEX, may refer to: People and fictional characters * Tex (nickname), a list of people and fictional characters with the nickname * Tex Earnhardt (1930–2020), U.S. businessman * Joe Tex (1933–1982), stage name of American soul singer ...

-based computer

typesetting Typesetting is the composition of text for publication, display, or distribution by means of arranging physical ''type'' (or ''sort'') in mechanical systems or '' glyphs'' in digital systems representing '' characters'' (letters and other ...

system which started as a version of pdfTeX with a Lua scripting engine embedded. After some experiments it was adopted by the

TeX Live TeX Live is a cross-platform, free software, free software distribution for the TeX typesetting system that includes major TeX-related programs, macro packages, and fonts. It is the replacement of its no-longer supported counterpart teTeX. It is ...

distribution as a successor to pdfTeX (itself an extension of ε-TeX, which generates

PDF Portable document format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe Inc., Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, computer hardware, ...

s). Later in the project some functionality of

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was included (esp. multi-directional typesetting). The project was originally sponsored by the Oriental TeX project, founded by Idris Samawi Hamid, Hans Hagen, and Taco Hoekwater. In November 2024, LuaLaTeX was declared the recommended format for

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.Engine news from the LaTeX Project
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Objective of the project

The main objective of the project is to provide a version of TeX where all internals are accessible from Lua. In the process of opening up TeX much of the internal code is rewritten. Instead of hard coding new features in TeX itself, users (or macro package writers) can write their own extensions. LuaTeX offers support for

OpenType OpenType is a format for scalable computer fonts. Derived from TrueType, it retains TrueType's basic structure but adds many intricate data structures for describing typographic behavior. OpenType is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corpora ...

fonts with external modules. One of them, written in Lua, is provided by the LuaTeX team, but support for complex scripts is limited. Since 2020 LuaTeX includes the HarfBuzz engine for correct rendering of complex scripts using OpenType. An alternate approach can be found on GitHub. A related project is MPLib (an extended MetaPost library module), which brings a graphics engine into TeX. The LuaTeX team consists of Luigi Scarso, Taco Hoekwater, Hartmut Henkel and Hans Hagen.

Versions

The first public beta was launched at TUG 2007 in

San Diego San Diego ( , ) is a city on the Pacific coast of Southern California, adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a population of over 1.4 million, it is the List of United States cities by population, eighth-most populous city in t ...

. The first formal release was planned for the end of 2009, and the first stable production version was released in 2010. Version 1.00 was released in September 2016 during ConTeXt 2016. Version 1.12 was released for TeXLive 2020. , both

ConTeXt In semiotics, linguistics, sociology and anthropology, context refers to those objects or entities which surround a ''focal event'', in these disciplines typically a communicative event, of some kind. Context is "a frame that surrounds the event ...

mark IV and

with extra packages (e.g. luaotfload, luamplib, luatexbase, luatextra) make use of new LuaTeX features. (When LuaTeX is used with the LaTeX format, it is sometimes called "LuaLaTeX".) Both are supported in

2010 with LuaTeX 0.60, and in

LyX LyX (styled as LYX; pronounced ) is an open-source software, open source, graphical user interface document processor based on the LaTeX typesetting system. Unlike most word processors, which follow the WYSIWYG ("what you see is what you get") ...

. Special support in plain TeX is still under development. Further development takes place as ''LuaMetaTeX'' in connection with the

project.

External links

LuaTeX official site

LuaTeX Wiki

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Luatex Free PDF software Free TeX software Lua (programming language)-scriptable software TeX

Objective of the project

Versions

See also

Further reading

External links

References