I just downloaded and installed Texmaker. I've never used any (La)TeX before.
When I click the Run button with an arrow next to "Quick build" I get an error saying "Could not start the command". Why? What do I need to do?
8 Answers
(Also check out the MiKTeX tag wiki I just wrote up!)
The hardest part about getting started with LaTeX probably is learning what the different components you need are. Texmaker is an editor, but what actually compiles your source code and creates the document is within a (La)TeX distribution, the most popular of which are MiKTeX (Windows only) and TeX Live (Windows, Linux, OS X (as MacTeX)). You can read about some differences between the two at What are the advantages of TeX Live over MiKTeX?. I've always been using MiKTeX, which seems like a solid choice for a beginner to me. I am, however, considering trying out TeX Live as well.
If you decide in favor of MiKTeX, make sure to install the user mode (you're asked about that during the installation process), not in admin mode. It has nothing to do with multi-account configurations, but rather something network-y related. You can read about it at Difference between administrative and user mode of MiKTeX. But believe me, the user mode will make your life much easier. I wish I would've done it right away. (On another question that might come up before downloading MiKTeX: What is the difference between the basic MiKTeX and the complete MiKTeX?)
Once you installed a distribution, you might have to reinstall Texmaker if you want to avoid having to (find out and) type in all the paths yourself.
As introductory reading for LaTeX, I recommend The Not So Short Introduction to LaTeX2ε, which also has a section about the different parts of a working LaTeX system, if I remember correctly.
answered Nov 26, 2012 at 19:51
-
Thanks for the heads-up! I was about to install Miktex in admin mode, as I do that will all my apps. Feb 27, 2015 at 0:12
in my case I closed miktex-console then it works fine
I had the same issue(on Manjaro/Arch Linux). Delete / rename (safer) the .texlive directory in the home directory, and reinstall texlive-core. That would solve it.
-
-
@cfr, No it isn't. But it uses the same repos. So the behaviour can be expected to be similar.– jadelordDec 1, 2014 at 11:02
-
But it often is not similar as the record shows. Especially when things don't work properly ;). It is perfectly safe to delete
~/.texliveYYYYsince it contains only generated files. (Unless somebody has deliberately put other things there for some reason.) I doubt you need to also reinstalltexlive-corewhich won't (ought not) touch your home directory. It is probably a stale file or something if removing that directory solves the problem.– cfrDec 1, 2014 at 12:16
i have the same problem with you but i solve it finally:) I should explain my situation first, i use windows 7. The reason for me to have the error is i just download MikTeX(really takes a long time) and NOT install MikTex from the package i download before.
Basically for Windows, 2 steps:
Step 1: install and download MikTex which is a distribution for windows (Note: remember to install after downloading all the package)
Step 2: download Texmaker which is text editor
Here are some useful guides for you if you use windows http://www.howtotex.com/howto/installing-latex-on-windows/ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RL15I-6NQFQ
Hope that helps you and enjoy you day:)
I had the same error message with the bibliography backend biber.
Error: Could not start the command: biber
And I had not installed the package biber. (!) After installing, everything went smooth.
So, first of all, take a look if the package or command is installed, that is, if it can be executed in terminal.
answered Oct 23, 2019 at 14:49
Ok so, I've been following the solutions proposed here. However, when I change the path for pdfLaTeX in the command section in preferences, I can compile but not compile & view. Any suggestions?
answered Feb 13, 2020 at 19:01
In my case (not for fresh install, but the relevant question is closed as a duplicate of this), the issue was that I added an argument to the pdflatex command line that tripped TexStudio up. In particular, I added -aux-directory=tex-build. While this works fine if run directly from the shell, for some reason it doesn't work from TexStudio, it seems the dash confuses it: I replaced that with -aux-directory=texbuild (notice that the value doesn't have a dash now) and it worked.
I just had this issue.
Symptom: which pdflatex or where pdflatex failed, meaning pdflatex was not found in any directory on PATH.
The problem seems to have been an overly long PATH environment variable. There's a systemwide one and a per-user one that gets appended to form the effective value.
I edited the environment variable; I reordered a few of the paths in there, moving the MikTeX path up.
TexLivewith which you have all the packages downloaded and ready to go. I had an issue withMikTeXas I had installed it asadmin(well I think that was the issue -- really did not spend time looking into it), and then switched toTeXLive(both on Mac and PC).