Managing LaTeX Lecture Notes

Demos
Features
Directory Structure Explained
How to use
Shortcuts
- SXHKD
Setup

Demos

Features

Switch between courses with ease.
Create lecture notes and assignments one keybinding.
View the latex code, yaml code and all the pdf files for any assignment in a split second.
Open any lecture note with a twinkle of an eye.
Sync your notes to the cloud.
Get notifications when your next class/lab starts.
Source all lecture notes, the current one, the last two, specific lecture notes, or a range of lecture notes.
Insane keymappings already setup for you.
Beautiful UI, via Rofi.
Easy to install.
Will take about 5 minutes to setup after installation.

Directory Structure Explained

Here's a quick overview of how the directory structure of a course looks like:

.
├── assignments
│   ├── graded-assignments
│   │   ├── written-homework-01.pdf
│   │   └── ...
│   ├── my-assignments
│   │   ├── bibtex-files
│   │   │   ├── homework-01.bib
│   │   │   └── ...
│   │   ├── image-files
│   │   │   ├── homework-01
│   │   │   │   ├── image-01.png
│   │   │   │   └── ...
│   │   │   └── ...
│   │   ├── latex-files
│   │   │   ├── homework-01.tex
│   │   │   └── ...
│   │   ├── Makefile
│   │   ├── master.tex
│   │   ├── pdf-files
│   │   │   ├── homework-01.pdf
│   │   │   └── ...
│   │   ├── preamble.tex -> /home/singularis/Documents/school-notes/University/_files/assignments/my-assignments/preamble.tex
│   │   └── yaml-files
│   │       ├── homework-01.yaml
│   │       └── ...
│   ├── online-assignments
│   │   ├── homework-01.pdf
│   │   └── ...
│   └── solution-keys
│       ├── written-homework-01.pdf
│       └── ...
├── books
│   ├── book-01.pdf
│   ├── book-02
│   │   ├── master.pdf
│   │   └── solutions
│   ├── book-03
│   │   ├── master.pdf
│   │   └── solutions
│   │       ├── chap-01.pdf
│   │       └── ...
│   └── ...
├── figures
│   ├── figure-01.pdf
│   ├── figure-01.pdf_tex
│   ├── figure-01.svg
│   └── ...
├── info.yaml
├── intro.tex
├── lectures
│   ├── lec-01.tex
│   └── ...
├── Makefile -> /home/singularis/Documents/school-notes/University/_files/Makefile
├── master.pdf
├── master.tex
├── notes.md
├── professor-notes
│   ├── lec-01-annotated.pdf
│   ├── lec-01-blank.pdf
│   └── ...
├── papers
│   ├── paper-01.pdf
│   └── ...
├── preamble.tex -> /home/singularis/Documents/school-notes/University/_files/preamble.tex
└── UltiSnips
    └── tex.snippets

The `assignments` folder

This folder contains all the assignments for the course. You can break it up however you want. Just make sure you keep all the filetypes away from each other, i.e., all the latex files are in a folder, all the yaml files are in a folder, etc. For example, you can't do something like this:

.
└── assignments
    ├── graded-assignments
    │   ├── assignment-01.pdf
    │   └── ...
    └── my-assignments
        ├── files
        │   ├── assignment-01.bib
        │   ├── assignment-01.tex
        │   ├── assignment-01.yaml
        │   ├── assignment-01.pdf
        │   ├── assignment-01.py
        │   └── ...
        ├── Makefile
        ├── master.pdf
        └── master.tex

This will not work. For an idea of how I break up my assignments, take a look at the example setup. Once you break up your files, you then pass the location of those folders to the config.yaml file. Take a look here for more information.

What's great about this setup is that it's so dynamic. Say, you use a bunch of sympy scripts or jupyter notebooks for your assignments. You can create a folder, call it python-scripts or something, and then pass the location of that folder to the config.yaml file:

assignment_folders:
  ...
  python_scripts: "my-assignments/python-scripts"
  ...

Then, the program will automatically pick it up and display it in the rofi menu when you run the lesson-manager rofi assignments command.

The `books` folder

If you have a pdf version of your book and you don't have any solutions, then place the book in the books folder by itself, as such:

.
└── book-01.pdf

If you have the solutions to the book as one single pdf, create a folder inside the books folder and place both the pdf of the book and the solutions inside as such:

.
└── book-02
    ├── master.pdf
    └── solutions.pdf

If your solutions are broken up into multiple pdf files, create a sub-folder titled solutions and place them in there as such:

.
└── book-03
    ├── master.pdf
    └── solutions
        ├── chap-01.pdf
        └── ...

You can give the solution files any name you want.

The `figures` folder

I use inkscape to create my figures. When you want to save your figure, save it as a pdf, pdf_tex, and svg. I store figures in figure folder (duh). Here's an example

.
└── figures
    ├── figure-01.pdf
    ├── figure-01.pdf_tex
    ├── figure-01.svg
    └── ...

I then use the \incfig command I defined to include the figure:

\usepackage{import}
\newcommand\incfig[2][1]{
  \def\svgwidth{#1\columnwidth}
  \import{figures}{#2.pdf_tex}
}

The `papers` folder

A lot of times, my courses require me to read research papers. So, I download them and store them in this folder.

The `UltiSnips` folder

I use neovim to take notes along with the UltiSnips plugin. I store my custom course specific snippets in this folder.

The `info.yaml` file

Here's an example info.yaml file:

---
title: "Differential Geometry"
topic: "Mathematics"
class_number: 33103
short: "MTH-433"
author: "Hashem A. Damrah"
term: "Spring 2025"
faculty: "Faculty of Mathematics"
college: "University of Oregon"
location: "Peterson Hall 103"
year: 2025
start_date: "Mar 31 2025 Mon (00:00:00)"
end_date: "Jun 09 2025 Mon (00:00:00)"
start_time: "11:00"
end_time: "11:50"
days: "MO,TU,WE,TH,FR,SA,SU"
url: "URL"
professor:
  name: "Professor Name"
  email: "Professor Email"
  phone_number: "Professor Number"
  office: "Professor Office"

The `master.tex` file

Here's an example master.tex file:

\documentclass[notitlepage]{report}

\input{preamble.tex}

\title{Differential Geometry}
\date{March 31, 2025}

\def\nlecturer{F. Last}
\def\nterm{Spring}
\def\nyear{$2025$}

\def\othernotes{singularisart.github.io/notes}
\def\faculty{Faculty of Mathematics}
\def\location{University of Oregon}

\begin{document}
  \createintro
  \newpage

  \chapter*{0 Introduction}
  \addcontentsline{toc}{chapter}{\numberline{0}Introduction}
  INTRODUCTION

  LECTURE NOTES
\end{document}

How to use

To understand how the program actually works, take a look at the README located in the root directory of the code. It explains how the program works, what each file is doing, and how to use it as an API. This README is more of a user guide, so you can get started quickly.

Once you have everything setup, here are the following commands you can use:

Stand alone Commands

`lesson-manager -h/--help`

Shows the help menu.

`lesson-manager calendar`

This script hooks into your calendar, which you can configure in the ~/.config/lesson-manager/config.yaml.

To get it working, follow step 1 and 2 of the Google Calendar Python Quickstart, and place credentials.json in the ~/.config/lesson-manager/credentials/ directory.

I use the following polybar module:

[module/class-info]
type = custom/script
exec = TZ="America/Vancouver" lesson-manager calendar
click-left = sensible-browser "https://calendar.google.com/calendar/" -- &
interval = 60
tail = true

`lesson-manager init-courses`

This command initializes all the courses. Just make sure you have the info.yaml file in the root directory of each course, and that you have the templates folder all setup correctly. The script will then create all the necessary folders and files for you.

`lesson-manager source-notes`

This command will let you select which lecture notes you want to include in your master.tex file. Rofi will provide you with a few options to choose from:

current: This will source the latest lecture note you took in the current course.
last two: This will source the last two lecture notes you took in the current course.
previous: This will source the previous lecture note you took in the current course.
all: This will source all the lecture notes you took in the current course.
range: If you want, you could specify a range of lecture notes, like 1-3, or 1-8,10, or 1-4,8,10-15, etc.

One important thing is that, say, the first 3 lecture notes where on chapter 1, then the next few where on chapter 2, and so on. The program will automatically which lecture belongs to which chapter, and will source them accordingly. Here's an example of the content of the document in the master.tex file:

% notes start 0
\input{./lectures/lec-00.tex}
% notes end 0

\chapter{Curves}
\label{chap:curves}

% notes start 1-3
\input{./lectures/lec-01.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-02.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-03.tex}
% notes end 1-3

\chapter{Regular Surfaces}
\label{chap:regular_surfaces}

% notes start 4-6
\input{./lectures/lec-04.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-05.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-06.tex}
% notes end 4-6

\chapter{Gauss Maps}
\label{chap:gauss_maps}

% notes start 7-10
\input{./lectures/lec-07.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-08.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-09.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-10.tex}
% notes end 7-10

\chapter{The Intrinsic Geometry of Surfaces}
\label{chap:the_intrinsic_geometry_of_surfaces}

% notes start 11-16
\input{./lectures/lec-11.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-12.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-13.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-14.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-15.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-16.tex}
% notes end 11-16

It's important to keep the notes start a-b and notes end a-b comments, so the program can automatically source the lecture notes correctly. If you don't have those comments, the program will not be able to source the lecture notes correctly. If you don't want to include chapters, you can just do something like:

% notes start 0-16
\input{./lectures/lec-01.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-02.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-03.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-04.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-05.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-06.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-07.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-08.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-09.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-10.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-11.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-12.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-13.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-14.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-15.tex}
\input{./lectures/lec-16.tex}
% notes end 0-16

`lesson-manager sync-notes`

This command will sync your notes to the cloud. First, it will include all the lecture notes to your master.tex file, then it will compile the master.tex file to a pdf, and finally, it will upload the pdf to your Google Drive folder. You can configure the Google Drive folder in the ~/.config/lesson-manager/config.yaml file.

`lesson-manager strip-notes`

Rofi Commands

`lesson-manager rofi assignments`

This command will list all your assignments in the current course, via rofi. You can then select the assignment you want to view, and it will then list the latex, yaml, your submitted pdf, the professor's graded pdf, and the solution key for that assignment (if it doesn't exist, it will not show up). You can then select the file you want to view, and it will open it in your preferred editor or viewer, which, again, you can configure in the ~/.config/lesson-manager/config.yaml file.

`lesson-manager rofi books`

This command will list all the books in the current course, via rofi. You can then select the book you want to view. If you only have the textbook, it will open it up in your preferred pdf viewer. If you have the textbook and along with the solutions. If your solutions are broken up into multiple pdf files, once you select the solutions option, it will then list all the solution files in a rofi menu, and you can select the one you want to view. If you have the solutions as one single pdf file, it will open that up directly.

`lesson-manager rofi courses`

This command will list all the courses you have, via rofi. You can then select the course you want to view, and it will set that as the current course, via symlinking the chose course to the current_course path in the ~/.config/lesson-manager/config.yaml file. This will then allow you to use all the other commands, such as lesson-manager rofi assignments, lesson-manager rofi books, etc. I use the following polybar module to list the current course:

[module/current-course]
type = custom/script
exec = cat "/home/singularisart/.local/share/current_course" | sed 's/_/ /g' | sed 's/-/ /g'
click-left = lesson-manager rofi course
click-right = lesson-manager rofi notes
click-middel = lesson-manager rofi assignments

`lesson-manager rofi notes`

This command will list all the lecture notes in the current course, via rofi. You can then select the lecture note you want to view, and it will open it in your preferred editor or viewer.

Figure Commands

`lesson-manager figures create <name> [path]`

This command has a few options you could pass to it.

This will create a new figure with the name provided (something with <...> means it's mandatory, while something with [<...>] means it's optional), in the path provided (if not provided, it will just create the file in the current directory).

`lesson-manager figures edit [path/name]`

This will open a rofi menu with all the figures in the directory provided (if not provided, it will just open the current directory). If you pass it a file, it will automatically open it in inkscape, so you can edit it.

`lesson-manager figures watch [--kill]`

This will create a process in the background that will watch as you edit figures in inkscape, and when you save, it will automatically create a pdf, pdf_tex, and svg file for you, so you can use it in your latex documents. To kill the process, just pass --kill to the watch command, like so: lesson-manager figures watch --kill.

`lesson-manager figures shortcut-manager [--kill]`

This will create a process in the background that will monitor your keystrokes while you are in inkscape and will apply the styles based on your keystrokes. For example, if you type d a, you get a dotted arow, or if you type d l, you get a dashed line, and so on. See figures for more information on how it works and how you can customize the keystrokes. To kill the process, just pass --kill to the shortcut-manager command, like so: lesson-manager figures shortcut-manager --kill.

Figures

Shortcuts

Instead of typing out the full command every time, I've created shortcuts for you. They come with all the commands you can run directly from the lesson-manager file, along with a bunch of other nice ones. They are as follows (run like ./shortcut-manager.sh LETTER):

SXHKD

Instead of manually running ./shortcut-manager.sh a every time, I use sxhkd to manage my shortcuts. Here's how I do it:

alt + {a-z}
  bash /path/to/shortcut-manager.sh {a-z}
alt + {A-Z}
  bash /path/to/shortcut-manager.sh {A-Z}

Therefore, I just have to press alt + a to run lesson-manager rofi assignments, or alt + b to run lesson-manager rofi books, and so on. You can find how all the shortcut works in the shortcut-manager.sh file. Here's a quick overview of the shortcuts:

a: List all assignments in the current course.
b: List all books in the current course.
c: List all courses you have.
n: List all lecture notes in the current course.
f: List all figures in the current course.
F: Create a new figure in the current course.
s: Source the lecture notes in the current course.
S: Sync all the lecture notes in the current course to the cloud.
o: Open the current course in your preferred editor.
O: List all the professor's notes in the current course.
w: Open the url of the current course in your browser.
y: Open the info.yaml file of the current course in your preferred editor.
k: Open the notes.md file of the current course in your preferred editor.
K: Open the global notes.md file in your preferred editor.
m: Open the master.tex file of the current course in your preferred editor.

Setup

Install

To install the program, run the following:

git clone https://github.com/SingularisArt/school-setup/
cd ./school-setup/lesson-manager/
pip3 install --user .

Now, you can run the program by typing lesson-manager in your terminal.

Example Setup

I've already created an example setup here to understand how everything fits together better. If you want to use the provided example, run the command:

./install-example

Config file

The config file for the program is located at $HOME/.config/lesson-manager/config.yaml. You can edit it to change the paths to your files and folders, as well as the editor/viewer you want to use for opening files. Here's an example of what the config file looks like:

---
calendar_id: "primary"              # Your Google Calendar ID, usually "primary"
drive_folder_id: "notes_folder_id"  # Your Google Drive folder ID, where you want to sync your notes

editor: "nvim"
terminal: "kitty"
pdf_viewer: "zathura"

create_readme_file: true
highlight_current_course: true

notes_dir: "~/Documents/school-notes"
root: "~/Documents/school-notes/University/Year-1/spring"
templates_dir: "~/Documents/school-notes/University/_files"
current_course: "~/Documents/school-notes/current-course"
sourcing_notes_template: "\\input{#1}"

date_format: "%b %d %Y %a (%H:%M:%S)"
home: "/home/singularisart"
user: "singularisart"

# relative to current_course
books_dir: "books"
figures_dir: "figures"
assignments_dir: "assignments"
assignment_folders:
  bib_folder: "my-assignments/bibtex-files"
  tex_folder: "my-assignments/latex-files"
  yaml_folder: "my-assignments/yaml-files"
  pdf_folder: "my-assignments/pdf-files"
  graded_assignment: "graded-assignments"
  online_assignment: "online-assignments"
  solution_key: "solution-keys"

rofi_options:
  - "-markup-rows"
  - "-kb-row-down"
  - "Down"
  - "-kb-custom-1"
  - "Ctrl+n"
  - "-no-fixed-num-lines"

folders:
  - "assignments"
  - "assignments/graded-assignments"
  - "assignments/online-assignments"
  - "assignments/solution-keys"
  - "assignments/my-assignments"
  - "assignments/my-assignments/bibtex-files"
  - "assignments/my-assignments/image-files"
  - "assignments/my-assignments/latex-files"
  - "assignments/my-assignments/pdf-files"
  - "assignments/my-assignments/sympy-scripts"
  - "assignments/my-assignments/yaml-files"
  - "books"
  - "figures"
  - "papers"
  - "sympy-scripts"
  - "UltiSnips"

files:
  "assignments/my-assignments/preamble.tex": "symlink"
  "assignments/my-assignments/Makefile": "symlink"
  "Makefile": "symlink"
  "preamble.tex": "symlink"
  "UltiSnips/tex.snippets": "symlink"
  "assignments/my-assignments/master.tex": "copy"
  "intro.tex": "copy"
  "master.tex": "copy"

I know that this may look daunting, but it all makes perfect sense. I'll go in detail about each variable below. If you want to see an example of how the config file looks like, take a look at the example setup.

Calendar ID and Drive Folder ID

These are just the IDs of your Google Calendar that has your classes, and the ID of the Google Drive folder, where you want to sync your notes to. You can find those IDs yourself, cause you're a big boi now.

Editor, Terminal, and PDF Viewer

These are pretty self explanatory. You can set them to whatever you want. The program will then use those programs to open the files you select in the rofi menu. For example, if you set the editor to nvim, then when you select a file in the rofi menu, it will open it in neovim.

Create Readme File and Highlight Current Course

These are just two boolean variables. If you set create_readme_file to true, then the program will create a README.md file in the root directory of the course. If you set highlight_current_course to true, then the program will highlight the current course in the rofi menu.

Notes Directory, Root, Templates Directory, and Current Course

The notes directory is the root directory for all your notes. This maybe something like ~/Documents/school-notes, or something.
The root is the path to the folder where your courses are located. I have mine set to like ~/Documents/school-notes/University/Year-1/{fall,winter,spring}, and I store all my course folders in there.
The templates directory is the path to the folder where all your templates are located. This is where you can place the the templates folder I mentioned earlier. You'd place things that you use consistently throughout all your courses, such as the premable.tex, template of your master.tex, the Makefile, etc.
The current course is the path to the folder where your current course is located. This is where the program will create all the symlinks to the files you need for the current course, such as the master.tex, preamble.tex, etc. You should place this folder somewhere that's easily accessible for you, such as ~/Documents/school-notes/current-course. The program will then create all the necessary symlinks to the files in the templates directory and the current course folder.

Books Directory, Figures Directory, Assignments Directory, and Assignment Folders

All these variables are paths relative to the current course directory, i.e., where you store your books, figures, and assignments. Here's a quick overview of what each variable means:

The books directory is the path to the folder where all your books are located.
The figures directory is the path to the folder where all your figures are located.
The assignments directory is the path to the folder where all your assignments are located. This is where you place everything that's related to your assignments, such as the graded-assignments, my-assignments, online-assignments, solution-keys, python-files, folders.
The assignments folders is a list of all the items that you want to show up in the rofi menu when you select an assignment when running the lesson-manager rofi assignments command. You can add as many folders as you want, and the program will automatically pick them up and display them in the rofi menu. Just make sure to keep the naming consistent, i.e., if you have a latex file called homework-01.tex, then, it's solution key should be called homework-01.pdf placed in the solution-keys folder, its yaml file should be called homework-01.yaml placed in the yaml-files folder, and so on. This way, the program will automatically pick up the files and display them in the rofi menu when you select the assignment.

Rofi Options

These are the options that will be passed to rofi when you run the lesson-manager rofi assignments, lesson-manager rofi books, etc. commands. You can add any rofi options you want, and they will be passed to rofi when you run the command.

Folders and Files

The folders variable is the list of all the folders that you want to create in the course directory when you run lesson-manager init-courses command. You can add as many folders as you want, and the program will automatically create them for you.
The files variable is the list of all the files that you want to be created or symlinked in the course directory when you run lesson-manager init-courses command. You have a few options for each file:
- If you set it to symlink, then the program will create a symlink to the file in the templates directory. This is useful for things that you want to stay consistent across all your courses, and when you modify one, you want it to be reflected in all the courses.
- If you set it to copy, then the program will copy the file from the templates directory to the course directory. This is useful for creating templates, like the master.tex. You can even pass variables, like TITLE, or DATE, and the program will automatically replace them with the values you set in the info.yaml file.
- If you set it to create, and the program will create the file in the course directory.

Name		Name	Last commit message	Last commit date
Latest commit History 156 Commits
.github/ISSUE_TEMPLATE		.github/ISSUE_TEMPLATE
example-setup		example-setup
lesson-manager		lesson-manager
.gitignore		.gitignore
.tmux		.tmux
CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md		CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md
CONTRIBUTING.md		CONTRIBUTING.md
README.md		README.md
SECURITY.md		SECURITY.md
file-tree-structure		file-tree-structure
install-example		install-example
shortcut-manager.sh		shortcut-manager.sh

SingularisArt/school-setup

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Managing LaTeX Lecture Notes

Demos

Features

Directory Structure Explained

The assignments folder

The books folder

The figures folder

The papers folder

The UltiSnips folder

The info.yaml file

The master.tex file

How to use

Stand alone Commands

lesson-manager -h/--help

lesson-manager calendar

lesson-manager init-courses

lesson-manager source-notes

lesson-manager sync-notes

lesson-manager strip-notes

Rofi Commands

lesson-manager rofi assignments

lesson-manager rofi books

lesson-manager rofi courses

lesson-manager rofi notes

Figure Commands

lesson-manager figures create <name> [path]

lesson-manager figures edit [path/name]

lesson-manager figures watch [--kill]

lesson-manager figures shortcut-manager [--kill]