VSCode + LaTex on Linux

VSCode is a powerful and popular code editor from Microsoft. It supports a wide-array of extensions making your coding experience enjoyable. Though Overleaf, a web-based LaTeX compiler, provides one stop solution, I personally find more flexibility in using VSCode + Github writing LaTeX. Here's how to set it up using VSCode extension LaTex Workshop.

VSCode vs VSCodium

Nothing is perfect. It is import to point out VSCode, as a proprietary software from Microsoft, collects user data. If you do mind the telemetry, VSCodium is a wonderful open-source alternative to VSCode that is compatible with VSCode Extension. Some minor tweaks are required. This guide assumes you are using standard VSCode.

LaTeX Installation

Assuming you are using Debian-based distro that has apt package manager, the process should be straight-forward. First, you need to install bunch of texlive related packages to set up LaTeX environment. For a standard usage of LaTeX in academia, it suffices to install these three packages by

sudo apt-get install texlive-latex-extra texlive-science texlive-pictures

For future reference, should you need more LaTeX packages, look them up by

sudo apt search texlive

then install them by

sudo apt install [package-name]

Personally, since I use LaTeX to write my CV with EB Garamond font, a non-standard one, I have to install one more package by

sudo apt install texlive-fonts-extra

At this point, LaTeX environment is installed.

Extension set-up

Once you installed VSCode, go to extension marketplace to get LaTex Workshop. For it to work smoothly, you need to install few extra packages by

sudo apt-get install texlive-extra-utils latexmk

Et Voila! You are all set to write LaTeX on VSCode. After you wrote some code, press the green bottom to build the project, then you can preview the PDF on your right side.

Tips

One extra thing worth mentioning, that I wish I knew earlier, is LaTex Workshop provides PDF to Source and Source to PDF by using Ctrl + left click.