StableFill

Inspect and Init

StableFill has two helper commands for project setup and debugging.

Initialize A Project

Run this in a paper directory:

stablefill init

It creates a minimal layout:

stablefill.toml
tables/

The generated stablefill.toml is intentionally small:

template = "paper_template.tex"
output = "paper_filled.tex"
input_dir = "tables"
no_header = true

StableFill does not create a manuscript template. Add your own TeX, LyX, or Markdown template, then put one or more .txt result files in tables/.

You can initialize another directory:

stablefill init path/to/project

Use --force if you want to overwrite an existing stablefill.toml.

Inspect A Project

Use inspect when you want to understand what StableFill will do before it writes any output:

stablefill inspect

The command reads the same stablefill.toml file as normal filling. It also accepts the usual input and template options:

stablefill inspect --input-dir tables paper_template.tex
stablefill inspect -i results.txt paper_template.tex

Inspect reports:

• which input files were read
• which <Tab:...> blocks and <Val:...> values were found
• which template tables contain StableFill placeholders
• how many values each table has and how many placeholders it will consume
• inline placeholders that are matched or missing
• already-filled tables that are ignored because they have no placeholders
• unused input tables and values

Inspect is a dry run. It does not create or modify the output file, and it is meant to explain StableFill’s interpretation rather than validate every possible LaTeX compile issue.

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