certify produces formal landscape PDF certificates with configurable
color themes, optional logos, decorative borders, laurels, and corner
ornaments. The package is built on grid only — no LaTeX or Quarto
installation is required.
A step-by-step walkthrough, written for occasional R users, is included as a vignette:
vignette("certify")Install the released version from CRAN:
install.packages("certify")Or install the development version from GitHub. build_vignettes = TRUE
is worth including: without it the vignette is not built, and
vignette("certify") finds nothing.
# install.packages("remotes")
remotes::install_github("cwimpy/certify", build_vignettes = TRUE)
vignette("certify") # the walkthroughlibrary(certify)
make_certificate(
path = "jane_doe.pdf",
recipient = "Jane A. Doe",
title = "Certificate of Achievement",
award_name = "Outstanding Student",
organization = "University of Somewhere",
program = "Bachelor of Arts in Political Science",
citation = paste(
"in recognition of exceptional dedication, scholarship,",
"and service to the academic community."
),
academic_year = "2025-2026",
signers = list(
list(name = "Alex Chair, Ph.D.", title = "Department Chair")
)
)Three preset palettes are included:
cert_theme_classic()— navy and gold on parchment (default)cert_theme_formal()— black and silver on creamcert_theme_warm()— burgundy and gold on warm cream
For full control, build a custom palette with cert_theme():
my_theme <- cert_theme(
primary = "#003366",
primary_dark = "#001f3f",
accent = "#c0a062",
background = "#fbf8f1"
)
make_certificate(
path = "custom.pdf",
recipient = "Recipient Name",
theme = my_theme
)make_certificates() takes a data frame and writes one PDF per row.
roster <- read.csv("roster.csv") # a `recipient` column is all you need
make_certificates(
roster,
dir = "certificates",
organization = "University of Somewhere",
signers = list(
list(name = "Alex Chair, Ph.D.", title = "Department Chair")
)
)Columns named after make_certificate() arguments (award_name,
citation, and so on) vary per certificate; everything else stays
constant.
paper accepts "letter" (the default, 11 x 8.5 landscape), "legal",
"tabloid", "a3", "a4", and "a5". The design scales with the
page. width and height override it for anything else.
make_certificate(path = "award.pdf", recipient = "Jane A. Doe", paper = "a4")A logo must be a PNG. It replaces organization in the header and is
scaled to fit inside a box logo_height by logo_width inches (2 by
4.5 by default), keeping its proportions: square logos are limited by
height, wide wordmarks by width.
make_certificate(
path = "award.pdf",
recipient = "Recipient Name",
title = "Certificate of Recognition",
citation = "in grateful recognition of years of devoted service.",
signers = list(
list(name = "President Name", title = "President"),
list(name = "Secretary Name", title = "Secretary")
),
logo = "path/to/your_logo.png",
paper = "a4",
theme = cert_theme_warm()
)MIT © Cameron Wimpy