Try using Texlive container

.github/workflows/build-docs.yml

@@ -5,45 +5,64 @@ env:
   PDF_DOCS:   ${{ github.workspace }}/docs/build_pdf
 on:
   push:
-    branches: [main, develop]
+    branches: main
   pull_request:
-    branches: [main, develop]
+    branches: main
 
 jobs:
+  # Get user/group of runner account so that subsequent jobs can run containers
+  # using that account rather than root.  Based on discussions in:
+  #                https://github.com/actions/runner/issues/691
+  configure:
+     runs-on: ubuntu-latest
+     outputs:
+       uid_gid: ${{ steps.get_user.outputs.uid_gid }}
+     steps:
+       - id: get_user
+         run: |
+            MY_UID=$(id -u)
+            MY_GID=$(id -g)
+            echo "User = $(id -u -n) ($MY_UID)"
+            echo "Group = $(id -g -n) ($MY_GID)"
+            echo "uid_gid=$MY_UID:$MY_GID" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"
+
   build_pypkg_sphinx:
-    runs-on: ${{ matrix.os }}
-    strategy:
-      matrix:
-        # We would like to use 3.12, but this presently fails with the error:
-        # Could not import extension sphinxcontrib.bibtex (exception: No module named 'pkg_resources')
-        os: [ubuntu-latest]
-        python-version: ["3.11"]
+    # Prefer LaTeX installation by official image over manual installation to
+    # get more consistent and quick setup times.
+    #
+    # It's challenging at the very least to get a compiler suite installed in
+    # this container.  Therefore, we need to choose the OS and Python version
+    # such that pip can install all packages (e.g., the numpy version needed to
+    # build the package) from prebuilt wheels.
+    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
+    needs: configure
+    env:
+      UID_GID: ${{ needs.configure.outputs.uid_gid }}
+    container:
+      image: texlive/texlive:latest
+      options: --user ${{ needs.configure.outputs.uid_gid }}
     steps:
     ##-- General Setup Steps
-    - uses: actions/checkout@v4
+    - uses: actions/checkout@v6
 
-    - name: Set up Python ${{ matrix.python-version }}
-      uses: actions/setup-python@v5
+    - name: Set up Python
+      uses: actions/setup-python@v6
       with:
-        python-version: ${{ matrix.python-version }}
-
-    - name: Install LaTeX
-      run: |
-        sudo apt-get update
-        sudo apt-get -y install texlive-fonts-recommended texlive-latex-recommended texlive-latex-extra latexmk
+        python-version: 3.13
 
     - name: Setup python with tox
-      run: $CLONE_PATH/.github/workflows/install_tox.sh
-
+      run: |
+        echo "UID/GID from configure = $UID_GID"
+        echo "UID/GID actual         = $(id -u):$(id -g)"
+        $CLONE_PATH/.github/workflows/install_tox.sh
     - name: Build sphinx docs
       run: |
-        pushd $CLONE_PATH
+        cd $CLONE_PATH
         tox -r -e pdf,html
-        popd
 
     ##-- Make documents available as artifacts
     - name: Archive surmise docs
-      uses: actions/upload-artifact@v4
+      uses: actions/upload-artifact@v6
       with:
         name: surmise-sphinx-docs
         path: |

.github/workflows/install_tox.sh

@@ -10,7 +10,7 @@ which pip
 which tox
 echo
 python --version
-pip --version
 tox --version
 echo
-pip list
+python -m pip list
+echo