[tex-live] texmflocal

[Reinhard Kotucha]

On 2012-07-30 at 11:23:02 +0200, Mojca Miklavec wrote:

 > On Mon, Jul 30, 2012 at 11:05 AM, Vladimir Lomov wrote:
 > > Hello,
 > > ** Norbert Preining [2012-07-30 16:22:15 +0900]:
 > >
 > >> Hi
 > >
 > >>> Create file `texmf.cnf' and write to it
 > >>> TEXMFHOME=$HOME/texmf;$HOME/texmf-projects/STUFF
 > >
 > >> NOOOOOO
 > >
 > >> That is even MUCH MUCH less supported any will create much more
 > >> trouble. PLEASE don't do that!!!
 > >
 > > Then you may be know how to an ordinal user (i.e. not admin) can use
 > > several TDS trees in scheme that I described (separate TDS trees that
 > > can be switched on or off without messing TEXMFHOME)?
 > 
 > In principle one can add more trees to TEXMF variable. But I don't
 > know yet why multiple trees in TEXMFLOCAL or TEXMFHOME are not
 > desired, 

If such a variable contains a list of directories instead of a single
directory, and any program has to *write* files there, it's unclear
where to put them. 

 > I believe that gnuplot concatenates TEXMFLOCAL with
 > "tex/latex/gnuplot" for example, so in case that one has multiple
 > trees, gnuplot would have problems installing files there, but I
 > consider that being gnuplot's fault.

Exactly.  If they really re-define TEXMFLOCAL in order to prepend or
append a new tree, that would be disastrous.  If gnuplot prepends the
new tree and assumes that updates are supposed to go to the first
element of the list, all other programs making the same assumption
will install their files there too.  If the gnuplot tree is appended
and afterwards the user appends another tree, gnuplot will probably
install updates in the new tree.  These updates will never be seen
because the old stuff is found first.

BTW, I can't believe that Gnuplot developers do such nasty things.
I suppose that they simply create a directory "gnuplot" under
$TEXMFLOCAL/tex/latex.  That would be perfect.

Whenever a program has to *write* files, it's necessary that there is
a kpathsea variable which expands to a single directory.  Everything
else is based on guesses and thus extremely unreliable.  Even if brace
expansion is supported by particular programs, I strongly recommend
not to use it in directories where other programs might install files.

 > MikTeX has a nice GUI to add and remove additional trees.

Ulrike mentioned it already. (Are you surprised? :)

Regards,
  Reinhard

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Reinhard Kotucha                                      Phone: +49-511-3373112
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