[tex-live] CD /DVD images (some notes)

[Staszek Wawrykiewicz]

On 16 Jun 2003, Sebastian Rahtz wrote:

> there are 3 beta-texlive*.iso files on ftp://www.tug.org/texlive/Images
> to try.
>
>  .*live.*: uncompressed file system ready to run from DVD
>  .*inst.*: compressed zip files for CD

*inst* still cannot install on Windows. Please move TeXSetup.exe
to /tpm/

>  .*demo.*: ready to run cut-down CD

As I see, the only difference between *demo* (texlive-live.scheme)
and *full* is tex-langcjk, not counting /support tree, etc.
As for *demo*, /source/ is not needed, I think. So we have 20MB 
to spare. 
Fabrice, is source/source-win32-patch.tar.bz2 still needed ?

Conclusion: for all those people not equiped with DVD, *demo*
can serve as *live*: runnable from the CD, browseable and...
instalable for most cases. Additional (huge) packages can be installed
from the second disk.
If you put all install* + config* scripts and tpm/lists/ all 
*.scheme (without only texlive-full.scheme), all things will work
on Unix/Linux. Even "recommended" scheme can be left as default.
I checked that, howgh!

Using *demo* (I'd suggest *lite* vs. *full*) on Unix/Linux directly from
the CD:
1. as before, we can install texmf-var, copy some files to and set some 
   variables, than can configure, generate format(s), etc.;
2. we can also use the CD in really demo mode, setting
some variables and making the only needed format in the current 
directory, e.g. for bash tlcd.sh (just a skeleton):

#!/bin/sh
export PATH=/mnt/cdrom/bin/i386-linux:$PATH
export TEXMFCNF=/mnt/cdrom/texmf/web2c
export TEXMF=/mnt/cdrom/texmf
etex -ini latex.ini

then sourcing: ". tlcd.sh" 
 
Almost the same can be done in Windows. This is a strategy for bold
people ;-):
open command/cmd window
md test
cd test

@echo off
:: Run: tlcd e latex
:: where %1 - CD ROM drive letter; %2 - format to be made
rem observe case of the following ;-):
set Path=%1:\BIN\WIN32;%PATH%
set TEXMFCNF=%1:/texmf/web2c
:: we use only one TeX tree
set TEXMF=!!%1:/texmf
@echo Variable check
kpsewhich --expand-var=$TEXMF
kpsewhich --expand-var=$TEXMFCNF
kpsewhich texmf.cnf
@echo Now we'll generate the local format file: %2
@echo Press any key, or Ctrl-C to abort
pause >nul
etex -ini %2.ini
:: or
REM pdeftex -ini %2.ini
@echo READY! Happy TeX-ing!

One can ask: what about the editor for Win32? The answer is: every windows
system has simple "edit" text editor working in the command line, even win
xp ;-)) It can load without problems big files having unix line endings,
like texbook.tex. So it is quite OK for a quick demo... 

The another approach for running TL off the CD on win32 was already done
on TL7. Perhaps Fabrice can show us xemacs running from the CD, but for
average user such miracle could be too heavy.

The above are only examples what we can do with TL.
Just to consider.

Ps. I think that dvips on TL should be configured to output to a file
by default. Having "o |lpr" in config.ps always gives a problem on win32.
As most users want to preview .ps files (gsviev, gv), or convert it
to pdf with pstopdf, or use dvips in batch mode (tex4ht, etc., etc.),
or...
Sebastian?
 
-- 
Staszek Wawrykiewicz
StaW at gust.org.pl