Is there a way to render a single document within a project?

[roaldarbol]

Description

I've got a book project which has many parts. I'd like to send a single part/document to a colleague, rendered in docx. Even if I quarto render my-single-file.qmd it only renders the entire project according to _quarto.yml.

The file has its own rendering YAML settings:

---
title: My title
abstract: Something should go here.
author:
  - name: Mikkel Roald-Arbøl
    affiliations:
      - name: University of Sussex
        department: School of Life Sciences
format: 
  docx:
    output-file: the-article.docx
---

Is this in any way possible in Quarto? (I'm used to this kind of workflow from MyST so just checking)

[mcanouil]

That's the designed/expected behaviour.
If a document is inside a project, then Quarto respects it, especially, if you render from the root of your project.

Make a temporary copy or move inside the directory where the document is.

[roaldarbol]

Yeah, I did imagine it to be expected behaviour too. 😊 I think Profiles might be a good suggestion for this use-case! I'll play around with it and report back. Thanks @mcanouil!

PS. Even if I cd into the correct directory, I still get the entire project rendered; presumably Quarto looks in lower folders for a _quarto.yml file before starting the rendering process.

[roaldarbol]

Copying to a different location works too. Only thing one needs to remember is that other files, e.g. bibliography that normally lives elsewhere in the project needs to be copied over too.

[mcanouil]

PS. Even if I cd into the correct directory, I still get the entire project rendered; presumably Quarto looks in lower folders for a _quarto.yml file before starting the rendering process.

Yes, I was expected this but worth checking as I don't know well (or at all) the "project detection" algorithm.

[mcanouil]

Copying to a different location works too. Only thing one needs to remember is that other files, e.g. bibliography that normally lives elsewhere in the project needs to be copied over too.

Indeed, it's why after I commented I thought of profiles which seem better in this case as you don't need to worry about file paths and resources.

[roaldarbol]

Yes, I was expected this but worth checking as I don't know well (or at all) the "project detection" algorithm.

Same. Now we know. 😉