Formatting issue when creating page header in rmarkdown - r

Question

I am trying to learn Rmarkdown, but there is something that's quite elusive. I am trying to put my name at the top of every page of the PDF I print, however I also get the various headers from the text in the markdown file in the header, and it often overlaps and makes everything unreadable. I learned the basics from another thread on here, but still struggling. I only want my name in the header. I tried to modify it like what you see below, but then I don't get anything at all. This is my YAML:
---
title: "Something"
author: "something"
date: "42 42 42"
output: pdf_document
includes:
in_header: {My name}
fontsize: 12pt
header-includes:
\usepackage{setspace}
\onehalfspacing
---
Anyone who could write it so that I get only my name at the top of the page? Also, the onehalfspacing is the same as setting spacing to 1.5 in word right?

Answer 1

I think there is a conceptual problem: The things you put in includes: in_header: in the yaml are the files included in the preamble of your tex document, similar to what you have in header-includes:. This is not in any way related to the headline of your document.
If you like to change this, have a look at the fancyhdr latex package
Please also note that the syntax for multiline header-includes: is wrong in your example. You need to prefix each line with -
---
title: "Something"
author: "something"
date: "42 42 42"
output: pdf_document
fontsize: 12pt
header-includes:
- \usepackage{setspace}
- \onehalfspacing
- \usepackage{fancyhdr}
- \fancyhead[c]{your name}
- \pagestyle{fancy}
- \setlength{\headheight}{15pt}
---
test
\newpage
test