Command-line arguments

TeXnicCenter supports the following command-line options:

filename

Start up and open the specified file. If the file is a project file, the project will be opened, otherwise the file will be opened in the editor.

/l linenumber filename

Start up and open the specified file in the editor and place the cursor at the specified line.

/p file

Prints the specified file to the default printer.

/pt filename printer driver port

Prints the specified file to the specified printer.

/dde

Start up and await a DDE command.

/ddecmd DDE-commands

If there is already a running instance of TeXnicCenter, then forward the specified DDE commands to this instance, otherwise start up and execute the given DDE-commands.

/nosplash

Start TeXnicCenter without displaying the splash screen.

Note

• If you want to influence a running instance of TeXnicCenter you should send DDE-commands directly to the running instance or use the /ddecmd switch.
• Use single quotes ' inside the DDE-commands instead of double quotes ".

Open a file in TeXnicCenter using another application or the command line

The DVI-viewer YAP shipped together with the MiKTeX distribution supports a feature called inverse search. If a DVI file opened in the viewer has been generated using source specials, a double click on a paragraph in the viewer will place the LaTeX editor caret in the appropriate line of the source paragraph.

To do so, your favorite LaTeX editor has to support the feature to go to a line and a source file, specified on the command-line.

TeXnicCenter supports these features with the command-line arguments listed here.

Multiple instance support

Specifying the command line

/l linenumber file

in viewer’s inverse search settings each time an inverse search is performed a new instance of TeXnicCenter will be started and the new instance will open the specified file and place the cursor at the specified linenumber.

Single instance support

If you would like to run only one instance of TeXnicCenter (and this is what makes sense most) you can specify the following command-line in your viewers inverse search settings:

/ddecmd "[goto('file', 'linenumber')]"

If you perform an inverse search now, the system will check, if there is already a running instance of TeXnicCenter. In this case the specified DDE command will be send to this running instance, which will open the specified file and place the cursor at the specified linenumber. If there is no running instance, a new instance will be started and this new instance will open the specified file at the specified line.

DDE commands

DDE is an acronym for Dynamic Data Exchange, which is Windows’ mechanism for inter-process communication (IPC). Applications can communicate via DDE. Though DDE is a very old mechanism, nearly all windows applications support its commands.

Normally it is not possible to send DDE commands to an application manually (i.e. from a command-line), but TeXnicCenter supports a special command-line switch /ddecmd which sends the specified DDE commands to an already running instance of TeXnicCenter or if there is no instance running, starts up a new instance and execute the DDE commands for that new instance.

The following DDE commands are available:

[open(“filename”)]

Opens the specified file. If filename is a project file, the project will be opened, otherwise the file will be opened in the editor.

[goto(“filename”, “linenumber”)]

Opens the file specified in the editor and places the cursor at the specified linenumber.

[print(“filename”)]

Prints the file specified to the default printer.

[printto(“filename”, “printer”, “driver”, “port”)]

Prints the file specified to the printer specified.