Customizing Typst

Override quarto callouts colors in typst

Go from this

original callout

To this, in typst

new callout

This is in reply to a question I saw on bluesky about how to change callout block colors in typst. It’s relatively easy in latex but can be confusing in Typst if you’ve never done it. I have an example file and output that I’ll walk through

• example file link
• example output link
• example typst-template.typ

How to

Typst in Quarto doesn’t work like latex. Instead of adding simple .tex partials to adjust minor things, you need to adjust .typ files.

1. Start with the default Quarto typst template with quarto create typst and it will give you
   • a typst-show.typ file. I never edit this
   • a typst-template.typ file - this is where the customization magic happens
   • make sure you read the comments in the first lines of those files!!!!!
   • reference these files in your yaml front matter like so:

---
format:
    typst: 
        template-partials:
        - typst-template.typ
        - typst-show.typ
---

2. if you want custom callout colors, you can change them in the typst-template.typ
   • it helps to see the raw .typ output to understand where you need to change the color in typst. put keep_typ: true in your front matter:

---
format:
    typst: 
        template-partials:
        - typst-template.typ
        - typst-show.typ
        keep-typ: true
---

4. now render your document and look through the output .typ file for the callout block function

5. when you find the callout block function, copy it and put it in your typst-template. you might need a basic understanding of Typst in order to see where to place the function. Put the function before the #let article function. it will look like this:

#let callout(body: [], title: "Callout", background_color: rgb("#dddddd"), icon: none, icon_color: rgb("#9cbe5b")) = {
  block(
    breakable: false, 
    fill: rgb("#a6c72e"), // I changed the color here
    stroke: (paint: icon_color, thickness: 0.5pt, cap: "round"), 
    width: 100%, 
    radius: 2pt,
    block(
      inset: 1pt,
      width: 100%, 
      below: 0pt, 
      block(
        fill: rgb("#c03c14"), 
        width: 100%, 
        inset: 8pt)[#text(icon_color, weight: 900)[#icon] #title]) +
      if(body != []){
        block(
          inset: 1pt, 
          width: 100%, 
          block(fill: white, width: 100%, inset: 8pt, body))
      }
    )
}

5. Now you can change the fill colors and icon colors to whatever you want by adjusting them in that function.

From here you can just render the qmd file and it should change the colors.

Changing typst within the qmd

You can also write Typst code inside of the qmd file.

If you have some text that you want to decorate, you can surround the text in code like this

```{=typst}
    #parameters-here()[ code here
```
regular markdown text here

```{=typst}
    ] //end function bracket here
```

Here I’m importing a custom typst library, tweaking some parameters, and wrapping it around regular markdown text:

```{=typst}
#import "@preview/showybox:2.0.1": showybox

// Second showybox
#showybox(
  title-style: (
    boxed-style: (
      anchor: (
        x: center,
        y: horizon
      ),
      radius: (top-left: 10pt, bottom-right: 10pt, rest: 0pt),
    )
  ),
  frame: (
    title-color: green.darken(40%),
    body-color: green.lighten(80%),
    footer-color: green.lighten(60%),
    border-color: green.darken(60%),
    radius: (top-left: 10pt, bottom-right: 10pt, rest: 0pt)
  ),
  title: "Key Findings",
  footer: text(size: 10pt, weight: 600, emph("Please see Situation Updates for COE group updates"))
)[
  
```
:::{.content-visible when-format="html"}
# Key Findings
:::

-   Current data reflects a mixture of x descendents as the.\
-   Globally no other x with unusual characteristics have been identified as having unusual growth.
-   Some other point

```{=typst}
    ]
```

and it gives this as a result: