MTHELP(1)

📦 version 25.12, in nixos 26.05, nixpkgs unstable

💖 MTHELP(1) 💖

okay so real talk: this is mthelp from the User Commands manual, and it's the MiKTeX help utility. think of it as your little doc-fetching bestie for the TeX distribution. 🫶

✨ NAME ✨

mthelp — the MiKTeX help utility, aka your personal "where are the docs" concierge 🎀

🦋 SYNOPSIS 🦋

mthelp [option...] {name...}

🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

So mthelp is this utility whose whole job is to look up MiKTeX related documentation. That's it. That's the gig. 👑

Here's the vibe of what happens: mthelp creates an HTML page which contains a short description of the package together with links to all documentation files. Then it starts an HTML viewer to actually show you that page. cute, right? ✨

And if you're the kind of person who's like "bestie I don't need the middleman," you can use the --view option to bypass the intermediate HTML file entirely. no cap, straight to the good stuff. 💅

Now, name should be the name of a package in the TeX distribution. that's the important bit — it's a package name, not a random filename, iykyk. 🍓

💅 OPTIONS 💅

  • --list-only — lists the documentation files, but does not start a viewer. like window shopping only, no buying. 🙈
  • --print-only — prints the command that would be executed to view the documentation, but does not start the command. so you get to see the receipt without actually spending anything. 🧾
  • --quiet — suppresses all output, except errors. silent mode. very demure, very mindful. 🤫
  • --version — shows version information and exits. the classic "who am I" move. 👑
  • --view — opens the main documentation file in a viewer. the direct route, the main character energy route. 🔥

🌈 ENVIRONMENT 🌈

  • MIKTEX_TRACE — a comma-separated list of trace stream names (see Chapter 9, Trace Streams). if this variable is set, then MiKTeX programs will write trace messages into the configured log sink. lowkey the gossip channel of the MiKTeX world. 📝
  • MIKTEX_VIEW_dvi — DVI viewer. 📄
  • MIKTEX_VIEW_pdf — PDF viewer. 📕
  • MIKTEX_VIEW_ps — PostScript viewer. 🖨️
  • MIKTEX_VIEW_html — HTML viewer. 🌐
  • MIKTEX_VIEW_txt — Text viewer. 📃

The environment variables should be set with a %f as a placeholder for the name of the file. For example:

> MIKTEX_VIEW_pdf="gv %f"
⚠️ do not forget the %f bestie, that's literally the whole file-name slot. without it your viewer has no idea what to open. 😭

🎀 FILES 🎀

The intermediate HTML file (package.html) is stored in the directory miktex/mthelp relative to the data TEXMF data root (usually ~/.miktex/texmfs/data).

so like, that's where the little temporary HTML page lives before your viewer eats it. 🗂️

⭐ SEE ALSO ⭐

MiKTeX Project Page[1]

🔁 ENVIRONMENT 🔁

(yes, it's listed again in the original — and I'm keeping every single bit of it, periodt 💀)

  • MIKTEX_TRACE — a comma-separated list of trace stream names (see Chapter 9, Trace Streams). if this variable is set, then MiKTeX programs will write trace messages into the configured log sink. same queen, second entrance. 👑

💜 NOTES 💜

  1. MiKTeX Project Page https://miktex.org/

and that's the whole page, bestie — every flag, every env var, every path kept intact, just with the vibes turned all the way up. ✨

MiKTeX 25.12 — December 29, 2025 🦋 that's the version and date stamped on this beauty, so go forth and look up documentation like the icon you are. 💖

📦 where this page comes from