Quick start

Format a file

clat formats .tex files in place by default:

clat main.tex

Pass as many files as you like:

clat main.tex appendix.tex sections/*.tex

Each enabled fixable rule is applied, and clat prints a short report of what it did. The threshold controls whether fixes are reported as clangs or quieter splats; weight 0 disables a rule.

Format a whole document

If your document is split across files with \input and \include, point clat at the root file with -r and it will follow those references and format every .tex file in the tree:

clat -r main.tex

See Multi-file documents for the details.

Look before you leap

Not ready to rewrite anything? Use --check for a dry run. clat reports what would change but leaves your files untouched:

clat --check main.tex

This is what you'd run in CI or a pre-commit hook: it exits non-zero if there is anything to fix or flag, and zero if the file is already clean.

Write somewhere else

To leave the input untouched and write the formatted result to a new file (single input only):

clat -o main.clean.tex main.tex

See the rules

List every rule with its number, current weight, and resulting category for your current threshold:

clat list

clat v0.4.0  …
  threshold = 5

  ✓  1: clang  w=8   labels_inline
  ✓  2: splat  w=6   decorative_comments
  …
  ✗ 15: clunk  w=6   hardcoded_refs
  …

A ✓ marks a fixable rule, ✗ an unfixable (detect-only) one. The middle column is the live category — clang, clunk, splat, or off — given your threshold.

Reading a report

A typical run looks like this:

  main.tex: fixed 4 rules (12 times), 1 clunk (2 times), 2 splats (3 times)
    Figure 3 …  main.tex:118: possible hardcoded ref: "Figure 3"
    …

• clangs are the auto-fixes clat already applied.
• clunks are problems clat can detect but can't fix — over to you.
• splats are advisory; below your threshold, so reported but low-priority.
• off rules have weight 0 and are skipped entirely.

If there are any clunks or splats, clat exits with status 1, so it slots neatly into scripts and CI.

Tune it for one run

Override the threshold for a single invocation without touching your config:

clat --threshold 3 main.tex   # more rules become clangs/clunks
clat --threshold 9 main.tex   # only the highest-weight rules fire loudly

To make a change stick, see Configuration.