The discussion comments suggest the `layout` option is the culprit:

````

```{r echo=FALSE, fig.height=30, layout="l-page"}
cross_plot_clean
```
````

### Discussed in https://github.com/quarto-dev/quarto-cli/discussions/3761

<div type='discussions-op-text'>

<sup>Originally posted by **werkstattcodes** December 26, 2022</sup>
Hello,

I am moving some posts from my distill blog to quarto. In several instances, I get the following error message when rendering the posts with quarto:

```
Error running filter C:/Users/Roland/AppData/Local/Programs/Quarto/share/filters/layout/layout.lua:
...ata\Local\Programs\Quarto\share\pandoc\datadir\_json.lua:167: bad 'for' initial value (number expected, got nil)
stack traceback:
        ...ata\Local\Programs\Quarto\share\pandoc\datadir\_json.lua:381: in function '_json.decode'
        ...ta/Local/Programs/Quarto/share/filters/layout/layout.lua:3754: in function 'parseLayoutWidths'
        ...ta/Local/Programs/Quarto/share/filters/layout/layout.lua:4419: in function 'layoutCells'
        ...ta/Local/Programs/Quarto/share/filters/layout/layout.lua:4240: in function <...ta/Local/Programs/Quarto/share/filters/layout/layout.lua:4233>
ERROR: unexpected character 'l' at line 1 col 1
```

Any idea what this could be due to?  I can run all cells (Quarto: Run All Cells) without the problem. The code of one such post would be available [here](https://github.com/werkstattcodes/distill_clean/blob/master/_post/2020-03-02-primary-schools-in-vienna/primary-schools-in-vienna.Rmd).

Any hint most welcome. Many thanks!

PS: I think I saw somewhere a function which allows  rendering a document only up to a specific point (in contrast to the entire document). If anyone knows what I mean, it would help me to isolate the issue to i.e. a specific chunk. Thanks again.

</div>
cscheid
2023-01-09T15:57:23Z
cscheid
bug needs-repro
closed
lua error message when rendering blog post
https://github.com/quarto-dev/quarto-cli/issues/3897