Can't run marp with neovim jobstart or with plenary.job

[TylerLaBree]

When editing specific files with neovim, I'd like to run marp to compile to pdf on each write. I've written a function below to run marp on the current file. In this case, I'm using plenary.nvim - job to run this command, but I have the same problem with neovim - jobstart. The problem is that marp doesn't finish in the allotted time (10 minutes doesn't seem to be enough).

When running an identical marp command in the terminal, it finishes in ~3 seconds. Take a look at input and output below.

Terminal command and output

$ time marp /home/tyler/Documents/ZK_Journal/journal/dune-weekly/test.md --pdf --theme-set /home/tyler/Documents/ZK_Journal/themes/ -o /home/tyler/Documents/ZK_Journal/journal/dune-weekly/test.pdf
[  INFO ] Converting 1 markdown...
[  INFO ] Documents/ZK_Journal/journal/dune-weekly/test.md => Documents/ZK_Journal/journal/dune-weekly/test.pdf

real	0m3.081s
user	0m0.696s
sys	0m0.139s

Neovim function using plenary.nvim (in ~/.config/nvim/lua/user/zk.lua)

local M = {}
...
function M.compile_with_marp()
    local current_dir = vim.fn.expand("%:p:h")
    local file_base = vim.fn.expand("%:t:r")
    local md_file = current_dir .. "/" .. file_base .. ".md"
    local pdf_file = current_dir .. "/" .. file_base .. ".pdf"
    local Job = require'plenary.job'
    Job:new({
        command = 'marp',
        --args = { '--help' },
        args = { md_file, '--pdf', '--browser-path', '/usr/bin/chromium-browser', '--theme-set', '/home/tyler/Documents/ZK_Journal/themes/', '-o', pdf_file },
        cwd = current_dir,
    }):sync(60000) -- Timeout in 1 minute and wait for completion. Could use :start instead.
end
...
return M

Lua command and output

:lua require('user.zk').compile_with_marp()
E5108: Error executing lua .../.local/share/nvim/lazy/plenary.nvim/lua/plenary/job.lua:499: 'marp /home/tyler/Documents/ZK_Journal/journal/dune-weekly/test.md --pdf --browser-path /usr/bin/chromium-browser --theme-set /home/tyler/Documents/ZK_Journal/themes/ -o /home/tyler/Documents/ZK_Journal/journal/dune-weekly/test.pdf' was unable to complete in 60000 ms
stack traceback:
        [C]: in function 'error'
        .../.local/share/nvim/lazy/plenary.nvim/lua/plenary/job.lua:499: in function 'wait'
        .../.local/share/nvim/lazy/plenary.nvim/lua/plenary/job.lua:453: in function 'sync'
        /home/tyler/.config/nvim/lua/user/zk.lua:99: in function 'compile_with_marp'
        [string ":lua"]:1: in main chunk

Also, I've checked a few basic things. Running which marp and marp --help work fine in vim.fn.jobstart and plenary.job:start.

What could cause this problem?

[TylerLaBree]

I've checked another couple of cases. The simplest case of compilation to html fails only sometimes with a 12 second window. With a 1 minute window, it typically succeeds.

function M.compile_with_marp()
    local Job = require'plenary.job'
    Job:new({
        command = 'marp',
        args = { 'test.md' },
        cwd = '/home/tyler/Documents/ZK_Journal/journal/dune-weekly',
    }):sync(12000) -- Timeout in 12 seconds and wait for completion
end

The more complicated case of pdf compilation usually fails with a 60 second window.

function M.compile_with_marp()
    local Job = require'plenary.job'
    Job:new({
        command = 'marp',
        args = { '--pdf', '--browser-path', '/usr/bin/chromium-browser', '-- test.md' },
        cwd = '/home/tyler/Documents/ZK_Journal/journal/dune-weekly',
    }):sync(60000) -- Timeout in 1 minute and wait for completion
end

This is confusing. Does marp-cli maybe use parallel processing in a way that it can't access in neovim?

[yhatt]

Please note that I'm not familiar with Lua and neovim.

When Marp CLI detected opening stdin stream, CLI would not begin the conversion until read stdin as Markdown contents and close the stream. If Job opens the stdin while launching, you should explicitly close it, or use --no-stdin option to prevent reading stdin.

Related:

• Why my marp-cli doesnt work in git-bash, but go well in powershell? #500
• Marp and inotifywait marp-cli#563
• marp.exe rendering and watch mode do not work in msys on Windows 10 (i.e. git-bash) marp-cli#573

If not resolved, try to add --debug=true or --debug=all option. It may help inspection the root cause.

[TylerLaBree]

--no-stdin is exactly the thing I needed. Thanks so much for the help! Here's the state of my function after fixing it up.

function M.compile_with_marp()
    local current_dir = vim.fn.expand("%:p:h")
    local file_base = vim.fn.expand("%:t:r")
    local md_file = current_dir .. "/" .. file_base .. ".md"
    local pdf_file = current_dir .. "/" .. file_base .. ".pdf"
    local Job = require'plenary.job'
    Job:new({
        command = 'marp',
        args = {
            '--no-stdin',
            '--config', '/home/tyler/.config/marp/config.yml',
            '-o', pdf_file,
            '--', md_file,
        },
    }):start()
end

And in my config file,

allowLocalFiles: true
pdf: true
themeSet: /home/tyler/.config/marp/themes
browserPath: /usr/bin/chromium-browser

And my autocommand,

vim.api.nvim_create_autocmd('BufWritePost', {
    desc = 'Compile markdown presentation with marp',
    pattern = '/home/tyler/Documents/ZK_Journal/journal/dune-weekly/*.md',
    callback = function()
        require('user.zk').compile_with_marp()
    end
})