pdfLaTeX_with_BibTeX_runner.py

# Calls the full pipeline needed to get a PDF with BibTex working
# pdfLaTeX->BibTeX->pdfLaTeX->pdfLaTeX
#
# Designed for use as a called script from TeXworks in the TeXLive distribution, but 
# easily adapted for other workflows
# Make sure to set texlive_folder below!
# Adapted from https://tex.stackexchange.com/a/308727

import os
import sys
import subprocess

texlive_folder = r""  # path to folder - should likely end with something like "\texlive\2019\tlpkg\"
path_items = [os.path.join(texlive_folder, "tlperl", "bin"),
                os.path.join(texlive_folder, "tlgs", "bin"),
                os.path.join(texlive_folder, "tlpkg", "texworks")
             ]
             
# add the TeX components to the path
os.environ["PATH"] += os.pathsep + os.pathsep.join(path_items)

# set up the commands we'll want to run, in order - the arguments come from what
# TeXworks wants to pass to the commands by default if we ran this all manually
# arg order
# 1 basename
# 2 fullname
# 3 synctexoption

commands = [
    ['pdflatex.exe', sys.argv[3], sys.argv[2]],
    ['bibtex.exe', sys.argv[1] + '.aux'],
    ['pdflatex.exe', sys.argv[3], sys.argv[2]],
    ['pdflatex.exe', sys.argv[3], sys.argv[2]],
]

return_code = 0  # start with a normal return code
for c in commands:
    try:
        subprocess.check_output(c)
    except subprocess.CalledProcessError as exc:                                                                                                   
        print "error code", exc.returncode, exc.output
        return_code = exc.returncode  # if we get any kind of exception, set it as our return code
                                        # but still try to run the rest
        
sys.exit(return_code)  # return the last error code we got so that if there was an error we let TeXworks know