TeTeX, TeXLive & mpm : which one?

[gotaserena]

I've made an ebuild for tex4ht for texlive, in the vain hope of trying to understand why tex4ht insists in putting equal signs "=" for forward slashes "/" and capital gammas for equal signs. It installs alright, though. It is also dirty. There should be a way that the ebuild reads TEXMF or the fonts directory.

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# Copyright 1999-2005 Gentoo Foundation
# Distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License v2
# $Header: /var/cvsroot/gentoo-x86/dev-tex/tex4ht/tex4ht-20050701_p1825.ebuild,v 1.3 2005/10/14 17:27:31 gustavoz Exp $

inherit latex-package toolchain-funcs

IUSE=""

# tex4ht-20050331_p2350 -> tex4ht-1.0.2005_03_31_2350
MY_P="${PN}-1.0.${PV:0:4}_${PV:4:2}_${PV:6:2}_${PV/*_p/}"

DESCRIPTION="Converts (La)TeX to (X)HTML, XML and OO.org"
HOMEPAGE="http://www.cse.ohio-state.edu/~gurari/TeX4ht/
        http://www.cse.ohio-state.edu/~gurari/TeX4ht/bugfixes.html"
SRC_URI="http://www.cse.ohio-state.edu/~gurari/TeX4ht/fix/${MY_P}.tar.gz"

LICENSE="LPPL-1.2"
KEYWORDS="~x86 ~sparc ~ppc ~amd64"
SLOT="0"

DEPEND=">=sys-apps/sed-4"

RDEPEND="virtual/ghostscript
        media-gfx/imagemagick"

S="${WORKDIR}/${MY_P}"

src_unpack() {

        unpack ${A}
        cd ${S}/texmf/tex4ht/base/unix
        sed -i -e \
        's#~/tex4ht.dir#/usr/local/texlive/current#' tex4ht.env || die
        sed -i -e \
        's#tpath/tex/texmf/fonts/tfm/!#t/usr/local/texlive/current/texmf-dist/fonts/tfm/!\nt/usr/share/fonts/texfonts/tfm/!\nt/var/cache/fonts/tfm/!#' tex4ht.env || die

}

src_compile() {

        cd ${S}/src/
        einfo "Compiling postprocessor sources..."
        for f in tex4ht t4ht htcmd ; do
                $(tc-getCC) -o $f $f.c \
                        -DENVFILE='"/usr/local/texlive/current/texmf/tex4ht/base/unix/tex4ht.env"' \
                        -DHAVE_DIRENT_H -DKPATHSEA -lkpathsea \
                        || die "Compiling $f failed"
        done

}

src_install () {

        # install the binaries
        dobin ${S}/src/tex4ht ${S}/src/t4ht ${S}/src/htcmd
        dobin ${S}/bin/unix/*

        # install the .4ht scripts
        insinto /usr/local/texlive/current/texmf/tex/generic/tex4ht
        doins ${S}/texmf/tex/generic/tex4ht/*

        # install the special htf fonts
        dodir /usr/local/texlive/current/texmf/tex4ht
        cp -pPR ${S}/texmf/tex4ht/ht-fonts ${D}/usr/local/texlive/current/texmf/tex4ht

        # install the env file
        insinto /usr/local/texlive/current/texmf/tex4ht/base
        newins ${S}/texmf/tex4ht/base/unix/tex4ht.env tex4ht.env

        if has_tetex_3 ; then
                insinto /etc/texmf/texmf.d
                doins ${FILESDIR}/50tex4ht.cnf || die
        fi
}

The last line is probably not useful anyways.

[hans_da]

I suggest using mpm.

Now I am using tetex, with combination of mpm to install other packages. There is simply too many Tex packages that cannot and should not be included in a single distribution that you must install. In my case, to write a fancy thesis will not use more than 10% of the packages packing with a complete TexLive system, but I still need to use some other packages that is not included in this distribution, for some special purpose. All these make me uneasy.

So I prefer to have the MikTex way, to install just the package I need.

[Berniyh]

@V-Li
I wrote a small guide on the Gentoo Wiki while I was installing TeXLive. Is it better to set the ROOTPATH or add it before emerging? Somehow it did not work to add texlive to package.provided. I had to add tetex. Do you know why?

I chose an additional folder for texmf-site to have my manually installed files and the one by portage separated. Are files by portage to be installed in TEXMFSITE in general? If yes, should I file a bug report for gnuplot-4.2_rc1 because it uses TEXMLOCAL or Maxima which uses /usr/share/texmf/?

Thx

EDIT: Added Maxima.

I installed Texlive using your Tutorial, but it doesn't work. I think it has something to do with the previously installed tetex.
Although I deleted all files that the tetex ebuild created and all configuration files (/etc/texmf and /home/user/.tex*) it would still look for
/usr/share/texmf and I don't know, why. The binaries are found but when I execute one of them I get:

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/usr/local/texlive/current/bin/x86_64-linux/mktexfmt: line 336: /usr/share/texmf/texconfig/tcfmgr: Datei oder Verzeichnis nicht gefunden
fmtutil: config file `fmtutil.cnf' not found.
I can't find the format file `latex.fmt'!

[panyo]

I've made an ebuild for tex4ht for texlive, in the vain hope of trying to understand why tex4ht insists in putting equal signs "=" for forward slashes "/" and capital gammas for equal signs. It installs alright, though. It is also dirty. There should be a way that the ebuild reads TEXMF or the fonts directory.

If it helps you in tracking down the problem, tex4ht has problems on other systems too. See for example section 6.1 of the English the Tex Live 2007 documentation:
http://www.tug.org/texlive/doc/texlive-en/live.html
The exclamation marks in the description of menu items are supposed to be right arrows. This is broken from 2005 to 2007 and was
ascribed to a probable bug somewhere in tex4ht or TL's tex4ht configuration on the Tex Live mailing list.

[nabla²]

I installed Texlive using your Tutorial, but it doesn't work. I think it has something to do with the previously installed tetex.
Although I deleted all files that the tetex ebuild created and all configuration files (/etc/texmf and /home/user/.tex*) it would still look for
/usr/share/texmf and I don't know, why. The binaries are found but when I execute one of them I get:

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/usr/local/texlive/current/bin/x86_64-linux/mktexfmt: line 336: /usr/share/texmf/texconfig/tcfmgr: Datei oder Verzeichnis nicht gefunden
fmtutil: config file `fmtutil.cnf' not found.
I can't find the format file `latex.fmt'!

The tetex configuration files were under /var/lib/texmf (the files in /etc/ were symlinks). Did you delete them? The kpsewhich utitlity helps to test the various texmf trees. Do for example

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sebschub@Satux ~ $ kpsewhich texmf.cnf
/usr/local/texlive/2007/texmf/web2c/texmf.cnf
sebschub@Satux ~ $ kpsewhich -expand-var '$TEXMF'
{/home/sebschub/.texlive2007/texmf-config,/home/sebschub/.texlive2007/texmf-var,/home/sebschub/texmf,!!/usr/local/texlive/2007/texmf-config,!!/usr/local/texlive/2007/texmf-var,!!/usr/local/texlive/2007/texmf,!!/usr/local/texlive/2007/../texmf-local,!!/usr/local/texlive/2007/../texmf-site,!!/usr/local/texlive/2007/texmf-dist}
sebschub@Satux ~ $ kpsewhich -expand-var '$TEXMFVAR'
/home/sebschub/.texlive2007/texmf-var

Please test all path mentioned in texmf.cnf. If you delete some files, do not forget to do a texhash.

HTH

[Berniyh]

I will try kpsewhich.

So far I recognized, that there was some user specific configuration left, after I deleted that it didn't want to search
for file in /usr/share/texmf. But the correct paths were still not set.
Actually I do think, that the whole texmf.cnf file isn't read at all.
I think it has something to do with the $SELFAUTOPARENT value. If I set that, then I get the correct trees.

I set SELFAUTOPARENT=/usr/local/texlive/current in /etc/env.d/98TexLive and now it works.
But I think, that this value shouldn't be set by the user?

[gotaserena]

If it helps you in tracking down the problem, tex4ht has problems on other systems too. See for example section 6.1 of the English the Tex Live 2007 documentation:
http://www.tug.org/texlive/doc/texlive-en/live.html
The exclamation marks in the description of menu items are supposed to be right arrows. This is broken from 2005 to 2007 and was
ascribed to a probable bug somewhere in tex4ht or TL's tex4ht configuration on the Tex Live mailing list.

FWIW, I've found that this was a font problem. I was using mathptmx, and everything went back to normal when I reverted to cm.

[Massimo B.]

Again:

• What is the LaTeX future on Gentoo?

Since the last app-text/tetex-3.0_p1-r3 is very very old and unmaintained and I can't get problems solved on TeX-Newsgroups anymore concerning packages of 2002 and older, and since app-text/texlive-2005 is also old, masked and a huge big tarball...
What can I do to install LaTeX?

Currently I'm going to replace every single package within the /usr/local/share/texmf/ tree, but that's hard to maintain because I have different systems accessing the same SVN tex projects.

Is there a new TeX-Distribution evolving I didn't hear about or will there be a serious problem in the near future?

[kuschelkriterium]

You might want to try and install texlive-2007.

Although it is not yet in portage, there is an ebuild in bugzilla: http://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=168177

I installed it yesterday on AMD64 (you have to remove /var/lib/texmf/web2c first, if you have a previous installation running), and it works for me.

It is, however, still a huge tarball, and experimental; but at least it's quite fresh...

[Massimo B.]

Fine fine, currently I'm loading the iso file. Would you recommend using the ebuild as a local overlay or rather the iso itself like explained here http://gentoo-wiki.com/TeX_Live_2007 ?
Will texlive work on ppc, generally?

Currently I have the old tetex and a lot of manually stuff on /usr/local/share/texmf/ . texlive will go to /usr/local/texlive/ . Where does manual installation sutff go on texlive?

[nabla²]

I have used the manual installation since TL07 was released (see signature) and I've had no problems so far... My microtype works.

[nabla²]

Currently I have the old tetex and a lot of manually stuff on /usr/local/share/texmf/ . texlive will go to /usr/local/texlive/ . Where does manual installation sutff go on texlive?

If you follow the guide closely, you'll have the following folders:

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sebschub@Satux /usr/local/texlive $ ls -l
insgesamt 12
drwxr-xr-x 8 root root 4096  3. Mär 13:57 2007
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root    4  3. Mär 09:26 current -> 2007
drwxr-xr-x 8 root root 4096 27. Mai 04:36 texmf-local
drwxr-xr-x 4 root root 4096 27. Mai 04:36 texmf-site

All your local stuff comes now -- yeah -- into texmf-local, all the things installed by Gentoo should go into texmf-site. This is the best solution IMHO to have a clean system.

EDIT:
For the ppc you maybe need the dvd:

In 2007, the inst version of TeX Live includes binaries for only three architectures: i386-linux, powerpc-darwin, and win32. (This is so it will still fit on a CD.) If you are using some other system, please use the live distribution instead; it also can be installed to a hard drive, of course. Ways to obtain TeX Live are described separately.

[Massimo B.]

Is texlive binary stuff, that it is published as precompiled packages?
Looks easy, thanks nabla (Where do you know from that my microtype is broken We know from the Usenet?

I started with the unofficial ebuild now, but it looks like it loads some prepackaged stuff from a mirror at /gentoo/texlive-2007-texmf-dist.tar.bz2, 464M. So maybe this won't work on ppc and I'll need the DVD iso anyway.

[nabla²]

Is texlive binary stuff, that it is published as precompiled packages?
Looks easy, thanks nabla (Where do you know from that my microtype is broken We know from the Usenet?

I started with the unofficial ebuild now, but it looks like it loads some prepackaged stuff from a mirror at /gentoo/texlive-2007-texmf-dist.tar.bz2, 464M. So maybe this won't work on ppc and I'll need the DVD iso anyway.

Yes, TL comes in binary form on the CD or DVD. The ebuild compiles it from the sources, so it should work on a ppc just as every other on ppc working package.

Yes, I read your post in dctt (which I read regularly but post rather seldomly as I left the noobish phase but didn't joined the "regular" state), although I didn't answer. You might find one of the developers there and in this thread, though.

[theRealMorpheu5]

Hello guys. I've installed texlive via DVD and now I'd like to have it from Portage. Is there something I have to do other than

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# rm -rf /usr/local/texlive

to remove the old installation?

Thanks.

[Massimo B.]

I think that's sufficient, quite easy. Maybe even the install setup on DVD can do this.
Then you could remove /etc/env.d/98TeXLive. That's all I found concerning the TeXLive installation.

[pindar]

Yes, TL comes in binary form on the CD or DVD. The ebuild compiles it from the sources, so it should work on a ppc just as every other on ppc working package.

Might be worth adding that the linux-ppc binaries have been built on a Gentoo system (my G5 with ppc64, 32-bit userland).

Overall, I find the lack of interest for TeX in the gentoo community quite depressing. I have installed TeXLive from the iso image and don't even bother with the portage version anymore. Sad, but true.

[lefou]

Overall, I find the lack of interest for TeX in the gentoo community quite depressing. I have installed TeXLive from the iso image and don't even bother with the portage version anymore. Sad, but true.

The Gentoo community are many people and you. If you are not able to write an ebuild or produce some documentation how to install TexLive or any other TeX system into a Gentoo installation the maybe you should find a Gentoo developer and convince him how important LaTeX support is or open/find a Ticket on bugs.gentoo.org and vote for a solution and find other LaTeX users with the same wish. Depressing or not, maintaining a TeX system can be a quite complex task. Offering your help may convince some developers that they would gain some community support if they tackle this huge task.

Btw, there are already many TeXLive package in the official tree. In what way are these packages not sufficient compared to the CD?

[mv]

I have installed TeXLive from the iso image and don't even bother with the portage version anymore.

Which means that you have installed some known vulnerabilities which are fixed meanwhile in the portage version

I also dislike that the current ebuild in portage does not provide a huge squashfs file which could be mounted into /usr/share/texmf-{doc,dist} - with the current portage solution you need twice the space (even if you keep /usr/share/texmf-{doc,dist} in a squashsf+aufs filesystem, because [unless you have a very good internet connection] you must also keep the tar.bz2 files in $DISTDIR), and installation takes a huge time even with prebuild packages, because all fonts/formats are recreated for every single package. So it has become very hard to get some latex running on a slow laptop with a small harddisk.

Anyway, despite I dislike the chosen solution, I will certainly use it in order to get security updates...

[pindar]

The Gentoo community are many people and you. If you are not able to write an ebuild or produce some documentation how to install TexLive or any other TeX system into a Gentoo installation the maybe you should find a Gentoo developer and convince him how important LaTeX support is or open/find a Ticket on bugs.gentoo.org and vote for a solution and find other LaTeX users with the same wish. Depressing or not, maintaining a TeX system can be a quite complex task. Offering your help may convince some developers that they would gain some community support if they tackle this huge task.

Btw, there are already many TeXLive package in the official tree. In what way are these packages not sufficient compared to the CD?

Just for the record: I am not sitting there twiddling my thumbs and waiting for someone to do the work for me. As I wrote in my post, I am helping the TeXLive project by building the ppc binaries, and I maintain two modules for ConTeXt, a TeX macro system. The packages in the official tree have no ppc keyword, so I can't even test them. I'm sorry if I sounded like a whiner, but it's just a fact that there is very little interest for TeX & friends here in gentoo. Other topics in the forums generate more replies and faster replies. This is why I decided that a pure TeXLive install would serve me better. I also fail to see the advantage of the way the ebuild system splits TeXLive into dozens of packages. Is this for users who may be on dial-up and have trouble downloading big files?

Which means that you have installed some known vulnerabilities which are fixed meanwhile in the portage version.

Care to elaborate? I'm not aware of any critical vulnerabilities in TeXLive.

[mv]

Which means that you have installed some known vulnerabilities which are fixed meanwhile in the portage version.

Care to elaborate? I'm not aware of any critical vulnerabilities in TeXLive.

It depends on what you call "critical". All the recent glsa's for tetex apply also to TeXLive. See e.g. the patches in /usr/portage/app-text/texlive-core/files/2007 (for details, look up the CVEs corresponding to the filenames; also other patches like xpdf-3.02pl* or
the *bufferoverflow.patch are security relevant, see the corresponding bugs mentioned in the ChangeLog).

[pindar]

It depends on what you call "critical". All the recent glsa's for tetex apply also to TeXLive. See e.g. the patches in /usr/portage/app-text/texlive-core/files/2007 (for details, look up the CVEs corresponding to the filenames; also other patches like xpdf-3.02pl* or
the *bufferoverflow.patch are security relevant, see the corresponding bugs mentioned in the ChangeLog).

Thanks for the pointer. The only thing that seems really significant is the texlive-core-2007-dvips_bufferoverflow.patch. xpdf is not part of texlive, so I don't see why this should be relevant.

[mv]

xpdf is not part of texlive

IIRC, xpdf is part of the texlive cd, it is just not installed by the ebuild. However, I would expect that there are also other executables besides xpdf on texlive which make use of the patched files (e.g. in form of a library). But this is just a guess, I did not check it.