mandoc-resume.txt (4580B) [raw]
1 # Typesetting a Resume with `mandoc(1)` 2 3 _Published: May 18, 2022_ 4 5 ## History 6 7 My first real resume was written freshman year of college in a haste 8 because a friend told me his dad's software company was looking to 9 hire interns. It was a scraped together Word doc that had typos in 10 the headers because ALLCAPSWORDS were considered acronyms and are 11 not subject to the red squiggly spell check. I didn't notice until 12 someone pointed it out to me after sending it out. I didn't get the 13 job. 14 15 Updating a resume was always way low on my todo list--the kind of 16 thing that didn't happen until it was needed. So this first resume 17 lived on for years in a similar format. Needless to say, I was never 18 really proud of how my resume looked. 19 20 Towards the end of college, I got really into version controlling 21 my written assignments. `git` for code wasn't enough--I wanted to 22 know, without another proofread, that I hadn't fat fingered a typo 23 into my essay since the last time I proofread it. So I started 24 writing my non-technical essays in `LaTeX`, which fit well into my 25 `git` workflow. 26 27 I decided somewhere around then that I would one day rewrite my 28 resume in `LaTeX`; however, there was no need at the time, since I 29 had already accepted a return offer to MathWorks. So I put it on 30 hold. 31 32 As I moved to Linux and OpenBSD on personal computers, the desire 33 to leave `docx` behind became even greater; but again, updating a 34 resume just wasn't fun. I had better things to do, like write 35 [Gopher clients](https://sr.ht/~akarle/gc/) using `nc(1)` and 36 `awk(1)` or [install Plan 9](/blog/exploring-plan9.html). 37 38 At this point, it's been years since I've touched `LaTeX`. I don't 39 have a compiler installed, nor do I remember the Vim setup I had 40 going that made for a reasonably fast preview cycle. Could I find 41 it in my [dotfile history](https://sr.ht/~akarle/dotfiles/)? Of 42 course (`git` for everything!). But the effort to port it kept 43 looking less appealing until a few months ago when it occurred to 44 me: _what if I could write a reasonable looking resume in `mdoc(7)`_? 45 I [had the experience](/blog/my-old-man.html), and UNIX has a long 46 history of typesetting. It felt like the perfect blend of: 47 48 - Easily versionable 49 - Plaintext / archivable 50 - Exportable to PDF 51 - (IMHO) The right amount of nerdy 52 53 So I set out to do it. 54 55 ## The Results 56 57 See for yourself: 58 59 $ curl -sS https://alexkarle.com/resume.7 | mandoc -l 60 61 There's of course a [PDF version](https://alexkarle.com/akarle.pdf) 62 too. 63 64 Overall, I'm really happy with how it turned out! 65 66 ## Lessons Learned 67 68 Originally I thought I'd try to replicate a more traditional resume. 69 Or at least hide the fact that it's typeset using a man-page tool. 70 71 I discovered pretty quickly though that `mandoc(1)` is focused on 72 `man` pages and less suited for general typesetting. Reading the 73 [`roff(7)` man page](https://man.openbsd.org/roff.7#COMPATIBILITY), 74 things like setting font, margins, etc are pretty limited (which 75 makes total sense if targeting a terminal more than a printer). 76 77 I realized my options were to switch to `groff(1)`, which looks to 78 be a more fully featured typesetting tool, or double down on the 79 man-page appearance. 80 81 For now, I've chosen the latter, mostly because I think it's a cute 82 hat tip to one of my favorite tools--`man(1)`. 83 84 In lieu of margin/spacing/font adjustments I was able to keep a 85 relatively compact feeling by: 86 87 - Using `.br` (line breaks) instead of `.Pp` (new paragraphs) 88 - Using `.Sy` (bold font) instead of `.Ss` (subsections) in WORK EXPERIENCE 89 - Creating a two column work experience layout using a `-tag` list 90 (importantly, the list items themselves can be lists for job description!) 91 92 .Bl -tag -width "YYYY-MM - YYYY-MM" -compact 93 .It 2021-10 - Present 94 .Em Senior Software Engineer 95 .Bl -dash -compact 96 .It 97 Wrote custom CLI tooling for bug triage and local development 98 ... 99 .El 100 .El 101 102 ## Conclusion 103 104 For the first time maybe ever, I'm happy with how my resume looks. 105 I had a blast learning some fine-grained `roff(7)` commands that 106 don't show up in regular man-pages even though I removed them in 107 favor of the classic `NAME`, `SYNOPSIS`, ... `SEE ALSO` layout. 108 109 I am not a lawyer, so I don't know for sure if traditional software 110 licenses apply to `mdoc(7)` resumes, but the MIT license does mention 111 "associated documentation" so I put one in the comments of the 112 source. 113 114 If you like how it looks, feel free to remix it and make it your 115 own! If you do, I'd appreciate if you keep the link to this post 116 and license in the header, but more importantly, I'd love to see 117 it! My email is in the source :)