R Markdown and Bookdown Templates to Publish Documents

Content

This package provides templates to publish well-formatted documents both in HTML and PDF formats. Documents can be produced locally or hosted on GitHub, where GitHub actions can update the published documents continuously.

Long documents are the main purpose of this package. Along with a GitBook or Bootstrap 4 version to be read online, their PDF version based on the LaTeX class memoir can be highly customized (see examples 1 and 2).

Functions are provided to make the publication of the documents on GitHub very easy, including their continuous integration.

Templates include:

• “Memoir”: a book template based on memoir. The HTML version is a GitBook or a Bootstap 4 book and the PDF version is formatted by the memoir LaTeX template.
• “Stylish Article”: an article for self archiving. The HTML versions are optimized to be read online and the PDF version is a two-column, well formatted article to be printed.
• “Simple Article”: simpler than the stylish article. The HTML versions are the same and the PDF version follows the classical ‘article’ LaTeX template.
• “Beamer Slideshow”: the HTML version is either IOSlide or Slidy and the PDF version is a Beamer slideshow.

Available HTML formats for articles are:

• GitBook: bookdown::gitbook
• Bookdown’s HTML format (bookdown::html_document2)
• Any format from the rmdformats package. rmdformats::downcute is by default. See the package documentation for other possibilities.
• distill article from the distill package (base_format: distill::distill_article option in bookdown::html_document2).

Getting started

In RStudio, either:

• create a new R Markdown document and chose the appropriate template in the wizard:
  • Use the menu “File > New File… > R Markdown…”, click on From template and pick up the template you want in the list.
  • Choose the location to create the document and the name of its directory.
  • Make the new folder an RStudio Project: use the menu “File / New Project…”, click on “Existing Directory” and select the directory created previously.
• or directly create a project with the appropriate wizard:
  • Use the menu “File > New Project > New Directory > Document Project using memoiR”.
  • Chose the location to create the document and the name of its directory.
  • Choose the document type in the list.

Articles and slideshows are produced by clicking on the Knit button of the Source pane of their Rmd file. Memoirs are produced by clicking on the Build Book button of the Build pane.

Push your project to GitHub and activate GitHub Pages to make your documents readable online. The following functions help simplify that task:

• build_gitignore() to create a .gitignore file. Activate git source control then.
• build_readme() to create a README.md file, that will be the GitHub Pages index of articles or slideshows.
• build_githubpages() to move knitted documents (articles or slideshows) to the docs folder.

Documents can be knitted by GitHub Action if continuous integration is activated:

• In GitHub Settings, enter two secrets:
  • EMAIL: the email address of the author,
  • GH-PAT: a valid Personal Access Token.
• run build_ghworkflow() to create the necessary script (.github/workflows/check.yml).

Credits

The feather in the memoiR package sticker is from Wikimedia under license CC BY-SA 3.0.

The memoir LaTeX package is on CTAN.

The Stylish Article template is adapted from LaTeX Templates, that in turn adapted it from a LaTeX class by Mathias Legrand. Its licence is CC BY-NC-SA 3.0.

Full documentation

https://EricMarcon.github.io/memoiR/