Alessandro T.

Posted on May 19 • Edited on May 29 • Originally published at trinca.tornidor.com

TwentyOneSeconds - a CV LaTeX template

#latex #resume #overleaf #template

TwentyOneSeconds - a cv LaTeX template

I started from the twentyseconds LaTeX theme
because I think a LaTeX cv looks more professional. It's also possible to do things like this:

I like the two-column layout but not the left column created outside the document.
Because of this I should set the dimensions of the second column exactly like those of the frame containing the text, making the use of LaTeX useless.

To replicate this two-column configuration I thought to use this clever solution based on the tcolorbox package.

First of all I created this basic LaTeX document:

% twentyonesecondcv.cls
\ProvidesClass{twentyonesecondcv}[2017/01/08 CV class]
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{blindtext}
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage{geometry}
\usepackage[most]{tcolorbox}
\geometry{margin=0pt}

\definecolor{gray}{HTML}{4D4D4D}
\definecolor{sidecolor}{HTML}{E7E7E7}
\definecolor{mainblue}{HTML}{0E5484}
\definecolor{maingray}{HTML}{B9B9B9}
\newtcolorbox{bgbox}[1][]{nobeforeafter,leftright skip=0pt,boxrule=0pt,enhanced jigsaw,sharp corners,#1}

\newcommand{\sidesection}[1]{
    \noindent
    \begin{bgbox}[height=\paperheight,colback=sidecolor,width=0.33\textwidth]
    #1
    \end{bgbox}%
}
\newcommand{\mainsection}[1]{%
    \noindent
    \begin{bgbox}[height=\paperheight,colback=white,width=0.67\textwidth]
    #1
    \end{bgbox}%
}

% tex document
\documentclass[letterpaper]{twentyonesecondcv} % a4paper for A4

\begin{document}
\noindent
\sidesection{col 1, pag 1:: \lipsum[1-3]}
\mainsection{col 2, pag 1:: \textit{\lipsum[1-5]}}
\newpage

\noindent
\sidesection{col 1, pag2:: \lipsum[3-5]}
\mainsection{col 2, pag2:: \textit{\lipsum[3-7]}}
\end{document}

You can notice that this example is already on two pages: it's ok to keep your CV simple and quick to read, but what if you have a long list of experiences to show?

Of course LaTeX is good because the markup engine should keep you free to think about your content, not concentrating on handle manual placements of borders, paragraph positions and so on. My biggest problem about this was filling empty space: commands like \vfill aren't working within newtcolorbox because the box has no fixed height.

Luckily (should be from version 3.70) it's possible to change this behavior; for this you need the options

height=<value>
text fill

As already said, the box can't use \vfill because initially it hasn't a fixed height, so these options are changing that. I use height=\heigthpage because my boxes' height are equal to the entire page height.

Last precaution is to avoid commands enforcing fixed value settings like the tikzpicture one used within the custom command \makeheaderprofile.

For some reason instead the custom commands used to create the skill sections (\skills and \skillstext) work fine.

Finally here is the result and the GitHub repository!

I published this LaTeX template on this Overleaf page.

Updates

2023-01-24

pull request from giocic2: fixed unwanted bfseries redefinition

2023-01-04

fixed wrong \cvlinkedin command

2023-12-31

Added options to transform address and skype rows into urls

2023-09-01

now it's possible to add an arbitrary number of skill bar sections with custom section titles, custom legends and custom skill values (see \customskills command)
improved clarity of \skills command
added some explanations about header and info profile sections
renamed \cvdate to \cvbirthdate, changed its icon to faCalendar
accepted a pull request from JeromeHen