[OS X TeX] TeXShop Feature Request

[Herbert Schulz]

On May 29, 2010, at 9:30 AM, Benoit RIVET wrote:

> Le 29 mai 2010 à 16:01, Herbert Schulz a écrit :
> 
>> 
>> On May 29, 2010, at 8:56 AM, Benoit RIVET wrote:
>> 
>>> ...
>>> Embedding the TexLive Manager, and enabling on the fly install of missing packages à la Miktex  makes sense (this may be achieved via TexShop engines); but why on Earth would anyone want to embed a web browser in TexShop ?
>>> 
>>> Benoît RIVET
>> 
>> Howdy,
>> 
>> Can you publish these engines? What else is needed besides the engines?
> 
> I'm sorry to disappoint you, but when I wrote "it may be achieved", I meant that I don't have the skills to program such an engine and that I leave it as an exercise to the reader ;-)
> 
> However, I can imagine that after a first run of latex, one should be able to decipher the log and know if packages are missing, then dig into the tmlgr database to check whether the required packages are available, install them with tlmgr and re-run latex.
> 
> That's easier said than done, but let's hope someone on the list  may be able to implement it...
> 
> Benoît RIVET

Howdy,

Something like that used with a BasicTeX distribution (much smaller that the full TeX Live distribution supplied with the MacTeX installer) might be handy. However, TeX Live already has a huge number of packages installed and the tlmgr database only lists the ones that are actually there already. The few packages I have ever had to install manually are either commercial or ``non-free'' fonts (TeX Live is very [overly?] careful about licensing) and some packages that are needed by old documents but which have been deprecated by newer packages (e.g., the glossaries package has superseded the glossary package but some old documents used the latter package and the commands are a bit different). Many of these are available via CTAN but will not be in the tlmgr database.

Good Luck,

Herb Schulz
(herbs at wideopenwest dot com)