[OS X TeX] Remarks on the /usr/bin/texprograms symlink

[Gerben Wierda]

On Nov 26, 2006, at 18:31 , Adam R. Maxwell wrote:

> Is the current TeX Live-based i-Package more recent than the TeX  
> Live ISO?  My understanding was that you tracked changes more  
> frequently than once a year, so users switching to the TL ISO now  
> might see some regressions.

Well, yes. As far as I know, people are now installing TL 2005 from  
over a year ago. My TL-based subset is from a week ago ;-)

> What skills would be required for maintenance of the TeX i-Package?

Mainly perl, shell and make to build i-Package. Being able to  
configure & compile open source software (understand what to do if  
something goes wrong there).

I'll say some more of this later. First the work.

Oh, and I will probably add the link business. I am just thinking  
about the safest way to do this.

G

PS. I wonder how anyone will be able (not even a group) to  
effectively support users that have potentially a large number of  
(slightly incompatible) TeX installs on their system. You can imagine  
what is going to happen to unsuspected non-technical users that have  
this, use them all by switching between them, run command line updmap/ 
fmtutil etc as explained to them on the web in many locations (some  
really out of date), and end up with stuff in HOMETEXMF that is  
partially compatible with their existing installs and a lot of hard- 
to-diagnose problems. To get support possible, you really need to  
limit the complexity. Trying for the optimum of low complexity and  
maximum flexibility is rather complicated.
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