Re: Mapping of teTeX files to TeXLive packages
Ralf Stubner wrote:
> On Wed, Nov 29, 2006 at 16:40 -0500, Kevin B. McCarty wrote:
>
>> I also wasn't clear on exactly where add-on packages should be
>> installed under TEXMFMAIN. I settled on creating directories
>> /u/s/t/tex/latex/feynmf, /u/s/t/metafont/feynmf and
>> /u/s/t/metapost/feynmf based on where other Debian packages put
>> things, but this was not immediately obvious. I guess TeX will
>> find everything under TEXMFMAIN no matter how it's organized, but
>> guidelines could be helpful.
>
> Nope. You have to follow the TeX Directory Structure (TDS) for TeX
> and firends to find their input files. See 'texdoc tds' for details.
> This is mentioned in section 3.2 of the policy. Do you have any hints
> how this could be made more visible? Thanks.
You mean this paragraph at the beginning of 3.2:
> File locations must follow the TeX Directory Structure, TDS. It is a
> bug if a package only conforms to an outdated TDS version. It is a
> more severe bug, however, if it conforms to the current TDS version
> but does not make sure to depend on an appropriately recent version
> of the Basic TeX packages or tex-common (that support this TDS
> version).
I must confess that I completely missed this, probably for two reasons:
a) there was no reference about where to find the TDS, and b) in part
because of (a), it isn't obvious from the text that the TDS does not
just refer to the list of "the following TEXMF trees" immediately below.
One big help would be to include a URL to the TDS in the paragraph
quoted above. I don't know if it's available in HTML format. Even if
it isn't, a pointer would still be very helpful, for instance "The TDS
is available in the texlive-doc-en package and the tetex-doc package; it
may be viewed by running 'texdoc tds' if one of these packages is
installed."
Alternatively you could consider shipping the TDS doc in tex-common
instead of (or in addition to) texlive-doc-en/tetex-doc, say in the same
directory as the Debian TeX policy docs.
To help deal further with problem (b), you could also break up 3.2 into
subsections 3.2.1 "TeX Directory Structure" and 3.2.2 "TEXMF trees in
Debian" for instance.
Hope this is useful.
best regards,
--
Kevin B. McCarty <kmccarty@princeton.edu> Physics Department
WWW: http://www.princeton.edu/~kmccarty/ Princeton University
GPG: public key ID 4F83C751 Princeton, NJ 08544
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