Re: teTeX and TeX Live interoperability

[Julian Gilbey <jdg@polya.uklinux.net>]

On Wed, Nov 02, 2005 at 05:01:49PM +0100, Frank K?ster wrote:
> > Another, rather radical, approach would be to use separate TEXMF trees,
> > ie, 
> >
> > /usr/share/texmf-teTeX          for tetex-{base,extra}
> > /usr/share/texmf-TeXLive        for texlive-{...}
> > /usr/share/texmf                for *-bin packages (pool files) and
> >                                 other packages 
> >
> > That way, /usr/share/texmf would become something like the TEXMFSITE
> > mentioned in the policy. 

I really like this idea!

> Namewise, I'd rather say /usr/share/texmf is TEXMFMAIN, and
> /usr/share/texmf-teTeX is TEXMFDIST_TETEX.  There might still be a
> problem with the order of trees:  In upstream teTex, it is
> 
> ...,!!$TEXMFMAIN,!!$TEXMFLOCAL,!!$TEXMFDIST
> 
> But in order for TEXMFLOCAL to be able to shadow files installed with a
> Debian package, either Debian packages have to install in one of the
> TEXMFDIST trees, or we must keep on swapping MAIN and LOCAL.

Several comments:

(1) Order is important: which of teTeX and texlive do we wish to take
    precedence?  Most relevant is probably: which is more likely to be
    more recent?

    This could be a debconf question, but then that would likely mess
    up config file handling :/.  Maybe just go with a default with
    instructions on how to change it, or a debconf note, or - I don't
    know what!

(2) Use of TEXMFDIST

    (Incidentally, why have we got TEXMFDIST=$TEXMFMAIN in our default
    texmf.cnf?  That might cause two lookups if a file isn't in
    TEXMFMAIN.  Why not just comment it out everywhere it appears, and
    list those variables which will need to be changed if TEXMFDIST is
    set?)

    We can't call a variable TEXMFDIST_TETEX, as _ has a special
    meaning, but we could call it TEXMFDISTTETEX, TEXMFDISTTEXLIVE.

    Easier, though, would simply be
    TEXMFDIST=/usr/share/{texmf-teTeX,texmf-texlive}
    or
    TEXMFDIST=/usr/share/{texmf-texlive,texmf-teTeX}

(3) We shouldn't be touching TEXMFLOCAL!  That's for local sysadmins
    to do (/usr/local/share/texmf is not under Debian control, as per
    FHS).

> > Of course, this would lead to some files being installed twice. I
> > personally could live with that ...
> 
> It doesn't sound bad.

Agreed.

   Julian