TeX Live 2020 pretest, texdoctk.exe

[Hoffmann, Jobst]

Am Mittwoch, den 25.03.2020, 21:05 +0100 schrieb Reinhard Kotucha:
> On 2020-03-25 at 18:15:13 +0000, Hoffmann, Jobst wrote:
> 
>  > Ok, but in a practical training I don't like to say "start your
>  > browsers", I'd prefer to say "enter texdoc scrguide" or "click on
>  > that icon and enter scrguide".
> 
> The former works as expected and texdoc is actively maintained.
> 
>  > In the labs I can install texdoctk.pl correctly, but at home every
>  > student is on her/his own and doesn't know, what's going on there.
> 
> Even if your students have a working texdoctk you cannot simply say
> "click on that icon and enter ..." unless you have checked in advance
> whether the package in question is supported by texdoctk at all.

I check that of course.

> 
> I recommend not to point your students to texdoctk anymore because
> it's unmaintained and incomplete.
> 
> The main advantage of texdoctk is that one doesn't have to know the
> exact name of a particular package in advance.  Thus there had already
> been discussions about a successor, at least many years ago.
> 
> Though nobody provided any code yet, everybody agreed that such a
> program should use texdoc in the background instead of an
> unmaintainable database.  I don't know whether the TeX-Catalogue
> provides enough information to create the menu e.g., sort packages by
> category.

The problem is that most students aren't accustomed to the cli, so they
have problems with entering commands. So doc.html is a good starting
point, but if I can't find an important package like koma-script, then I
have a problem...

> 
> Regards,
>   Reinhard
> 
>  > And additionally: On doc.html I can't find neither the
> documentation
>  > scrguide nor a link to koma-script, can you give me a hint?
> 
> --
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
> Reinhard Kotucha                            Phone: +49-511-3373112
> Marschnerstr. 25
> D-30167 Hannover                    mailto:reinhard.kotucha at web.de
> ------------------------------------------------------------------

Best wishes
Jobst
-- 
Prof. Dr. Jobst Hoffmann            Tel:   +49 (241) 6009-5 31 59
Fachhochschule Aachen Abt. Jülich   Fax:   +49 (241) 6009-5 31 89
Fachbereich 09                      email: j.hoffmann at fh-aachen.de