General ⇒ Error When Trying to Show Output

[MartinC]

Sumatrapdf is for pdf but YAP is for dvi.

Anyway, can you check if a pdf file is created when using pdflatex?

[A Tripolation]

How do I check that? I've defined the output to be a pdf...is there anything beyond that?

[frabjous]

How do I check that? I've defined the output to be a pdf...is there anything beyond that?

Open up the folder where your LaTeX file is (in Window Explorer or "My Computer", etc.) and see if there are any .pdf files in there being created.

[A Tripolation]

Ah. Well no, there are no pdf files being created... That's odd. Or at least I can't find any where there should be.

Does this mean I've defined some incorrect paths?

[MartinC]

Are there any messages that show up when you compile the .tex file? What does the log file say?

[A Tripolation]

I do not know what the log file is, but this message pops up when I try to compile it.

[ForwardSearch("%bm.pdf","%Wc","%|,0,0,1)]
Cannot execute the command.

Any ideas as to what that might mean?

[frabjous]

What exactly are you doing to compile your documents? (Walk us through it step, by step.) Forward Search has to do with opening the preview to the same place in the document where the cursor is in the editor. But that shouldn't be activated until after the document compiles, of course. If the .pdf files aren't there, the real problem is coming before that step.

[A Tripolation]

I have the code listed in the first step.
I go to Select Output Profiles and choose: Latex => PDF(Sumatra)
I then go to the Build menu.
I select Build Output. It works fine, no error messages or anything.
I then select View Ouput.
Sumatra is launched, but then I get that error message, and Sumatra says on its thing, "Error loading PDF file."

Is there anything else you need to know that might help?

[frabjous]

I have the code listed in the first step.
I go to Select Output Profiles and choose: Latex => PDF(Sumatra)
I then go to the Build menu.
I select Build Output. It works fine, no error messages or anything.

It isn't working fine if there are no .pdf files being created!

It can't view output that hasn't been built. So even though you might not be getting error messages, the problem seems to be here.

Are there log files being created? Log files are files named xxxxxx.log which should also appear in the same folder as your LaTeX files when you run the build routine. (On Windows, the ".log" part of the name might be hidden depending on your View settings, but it should be possible to figure out which ones are the log files by looking at the file types in Details View, etc.)

[A Tripolation]

Hrm. I'm having a hard time finding the .log files.
What is the typical place they are located? (I realize every computer is different.)
But the dialog box that shows the compilation on progress does mention some interesting things I just noticed. It gives these messages:

initexmf.exe: no formats .ini exist.
I can't find the default format file!
I couldn't open the file name: 'C:Users\Trip\Desktop\Hello.aux'
Couldn't find input index file: 'C:Users\Trip\Desktop\Hello.aux' nor 'C:Users\Trip\Desktop\Hello.idx'
Usage: C:\Program Files (X86)\MikTex 2.8\miktex\bin\makeindex.exe [-ilqrcgLT] [-s sty] [-o ind] [-t log] [-p num] [idx0 idx1 ...]

Does that help?