Knitting to PDF LaTeX Error

[robynmeadows]

I am brand new to using Rmarkdown and I am trying to knit to a PDF (I would actually prefer a Word document but I'm using kableExtra and every time I knit to a .docx the tables completely fall apart, but that's another problem altogether).
Whenever I try to knit to a PDF I get this error (this is with options(tinytex.verbose=TRUE)):

This is pdfTeX, Version 3.141592653-2.6-1.40.28 (TeX Live 2025) (preloaded format=pdflatex)
 restricted \write18 enabled.
entering extended mode
tlmgr search --file --global "/multirow.sty"

C:\Users\robyn\AppData\Roaming\TinyTeX\texmf-dist\scripts\texlive\tlmgr.pl: TLPDB::from_file could not get texlive.tlpdb from: https://mirror.ctan.org/systems/texlive/tlnet/tlpkg/texlive.tlpdb
Maybe the repository setting should be changed.
More info: https://tug.org/texlive/acquire.html
! LaTeX Error: File `multirow.sty' not found.

! Emergency stop.
<read *> 

Error: LaTeX failed to compile Request_0006.tex. See https://yihui.org/tinytex/r/#debugging for debugging tips. See Request_0006.log for more info.
Execution halted

No LaTeX installation detected (LaTeX is required to create PDF output). You should install a LaTeX distribution for your platform: https://www.latex-project.org/get/

  If you are not sure, you may install TinyTeX in R: tinytex::install_tinytex()

  Otherwise consider MiKTeX on Windows - http://miktex.org

  MacTeX on macOS - https://tug.org/mactex/
  (NOTE: Download with Safari rather than Chrome _strongly_ recommended)

  Linux: Use system package manager

I am aware that several people had this issue in the last several years, and I have tried all the solutions suggested on any forums with this same question to no avail. More information below:

I am running on Windows 11 Enterprise version 23H2.

TLDR of things I've tried:

1. tinytex::install_tinytex()
2. tinytex::reinstall_tinytex()
3. tinytex::tlmgr_install('multirow')
4. Downloading multirow.zip with Rtools
5. update.packages(ask = FALSE, checkBuilt = TRUE) and tinytex::tlmgr_update()
6. tinytex::parse_install()
7. Changing the mirror

Longer version of things I've tried:
I downloaded TinyTeX directly in R using tinytex::install_tinytex() two days ago. Today I tried tinytex::reinstall_tinytex() and subsequently tinytex::install_tinytex() again, still nothing. I cannot download/install MiKTex because I am on a company-managed computer (the website won't even load, suggesting that it's blocked entirely from my company), so I am pretty much stuck with TinyTeX.

A thread I found suggested running this: tinytex::tlmgr_install('multirow') so I ran that and this was the output:

tlmgr install multirow

C:\Users\robyn\AppData\Roaming\TinyTeX\texmf-dist\scripts\texlive\tlmgr.pl: TLPDB::from_file could not get texlive.tlpdb from: https://mirror.ctan.org/systems/texlive/tlnet/tlpkg/texlive.tlpdb
Maybe the repository setting should be changed.
More info: https://tug.org/texlive/acquire.html
tlmgr install multirow

C:\Users\robyn\AppData\Roaming\TinyTeX\texmf-dist\scripts\texlive\tlmgr.pl: TLPDB::from_file could not get texlive.tlpdb from: https://mirror.ctan.org/systems/texlive/tlnet/tlpkg/texlive.tlpdb
Maybe the repository setting should be changed.
More info: https://tug.org/texlive/acquire.html

Another suggestion on that thread was downloading Rtools then running this: install.packages("http://mirrors.ctan.org/macros/latex/contrib/multirow.zip") so I did that and I got this error:

inferring 'repos = NULL' from 'pkgs'
trying URL 'http://mirrors.ctan.org/macros/latex/contrib/multirow.zip'
Warning in install.packages :
  URL 'http://mirrors.ctan.org/macros/latex/contrib/multirow.zip': status was 'Failure when receiving data from the peer'
Error in download.file(p, destfile, method, mode = "wb", ...) : 
  cannot open URL 'http://mirrors.ctan.org/macros/latex/contrib/multirow.zip'

I tried updating everything with this:

update.packages(ask = FALSE, checkBuilt = TRUE)
tinytex::tlmgr_update()

and still no change.

I tried using tinytex::parse_install() with my log to install missing packages, and got this warning:

tlmgr search --file --global "/multirow.sty"
Warning in parse_packages(...) :
  Failed to find a package that contains multirow.sty

I downloaded the TinyTeX-1.zip file from GitHub but I know nothing about using the command window or batching, so I couldn't really get any further with that.

I tried changing the mirror

> tinytex::tlmgr(
+     c('option', 'repository', 'http://ctan.math.washington.edu/tex-archive/systems/texlive/tlnet')
+ )
tlmgr option repository http://ctan.math.washington.edu/tex-archive/systems/texlive/tlnet
tlmgr.pl: setting default package repository to http://ctan.math.washington.edu/tex-archive/systems/texlive/tlnet
tlmgr.pl: updating C:/Users/robyn/AppData/Roaming/TinyTeX/tlpkg/texlive.tlpdb

with the same result.

I'm at the end of my rope here -- does anyone know how to fix this in 2025???

[jrkrideau]

Is there any chance that you have Tex Live installed?

If so, I think you are running into a conflict between Tex Live and tinytex. I hit something similar a couple of years ago in Ubuntu Linux.

IF you do have Tex Live installed, my suggestion would be to wipe tinytex and go with a full Tex Live installation.

[robynmeadows]

I don't think so -- searching tex live on my computer doesn't yield anything but web results. I am wondering if it's a conflict problem as well, I'm just not sure how to figure out where the conflict is.

[jrkrideau]

Well, my inclination is to purge {tinytex} and go for a full Tex Live or MiKTeX installation if you have the disc space. Yihui created {tinytex} to save disc space–a full LaTeX installation eats disc space– but unless space is a problem a full installation seems the way to go.

As for other things causing a problem is there any chance you are loading any .Rdata files.

It is a good idea to set RStudio to not load a saved workplace.

It might help someone here if you supplied the output of

sessionInfo()

Copy the output and paste it here between

```

```

The other thing you might do is give us a chopped-down version of your Rmarkdown document that still generates the error and let us see if we duplicate it.