[XeTeX] XeTeX page on tug.org

[Ken Brown]

On 6/17/2009 1:09 PM, Gareth Hughes wrote:
> Ken Brown wrote:
>> On 5/29/2009 10:33 AM, François Charette wrote:
>>> Upon Karl Berry's suggestion, I have assembled a collection of links
>>> pertaining to XeTeX. It is now available at
>>>
>>>         http://tug.org/xetex/
>>>
>>> Suggestions for additions and improvement are welcome! You can either
>>> send them to me or directly to Karl Berry.
>> Following up on some private email discussions, I'd like to suggest that
>> you include (or link to) instructions for setting up fontconfig on
>> unix-like systems with texlive installed, so that xetex will find the
>> fonts shipped with texlive.  After some experimentation, I came up with
>> the following recipe; I hope people who are knowledgeable about
>> fontconfig will correct any mistakes.
>>
>> -----------------------------
>>
>> To set up the texlive fonts for system-wide use (assuming you have
>> suitable privileges):
>>
>> 1. Create a file /etc/fonts/texlive.conf with contents something like
>> the following (suitably adapted to the texlive installation directory):
>>
>> <?xml version="1.0"?>
>> <!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
>>  <fontconfig>
>>    <dir>/usr/local/texlive/2009/texmf-dist/fonts/opentype</dir>
>>    <dir>/usr/local/texlive/2009/texmf-dist/fonts/truetype</dir>
>>    <dir>/usr/local/texlive/2009/texmf-dist/fonts/type1</dir>
>> </fontconfig>
>>
>> 2. Create a file /etc/fonts/conf.avail/55-texlive.conf with the
>> following contents:
>>
>> <?xml version="1.0"?>
>> <!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
>> <fontconfig>
>>         <!-- Load texlive customization file -->
>>         <include ignore_missing="yes">texlive.conf</include>
>> </fontconfig>
>>
>> 3. Create a symlink to the latter in /etc/fonts/conf.d:
>>
>> $ cd /etc/fonts/conf.d
>> $ ln -s ../conf.avail/55-texlive.conf .
>>
>> 4. Run 'fc-cache -s' (or 'fc-cache -sv' if you want to see what's
>> happening).
>>
>> Xetex should now be able to find the texlive fonts.
>>
>> If you do not have sufficient privileges to carry out the steps above,
>> you can instead do the following to make the texlive fonts available to
>> you as an individual xetex user:
>>
>> a. Create a file .fonts.conf in your home directory, with contents like
>> those in step 1.
>>
>> b. Run 'fc-cache' (or 'fc-cache -v').  This step is optional; if you
>> don't do it, xetex will do it for you the first time you run it.
>>
>> ---------------------------------------
>>
>> Final comment: The texlive developers have been discussing the
>> possibility of simplifying this task.  The most recent proposal is that
>> after xetex is installed, the installer will create the file
>> texlive.conf (with paths adjusted to reflect the texlive installation
>> directory).  The installer will *not* carry out the steps above, but it
>> will print a message pointing the user to instructions.
>>
>> Ken
>>
>> P.S. The directories /etc/fonts, /etc/fonts/conf.d, and
>> /etc/fonts/conf.avail that I referred to in my instructions are
>> appropriate for my system (cygwin) and two linux systems that I know of.
>>  I'm hoping that fontconfig is standardized enough that they are
>> appropriate for all unix-like systems.  If not, the instructions will
>> have to be rewritten to account for this.
> 
> Thanks for mentioning this, Ken. On my old Ubuntu Hard Heron with
> packaged TeX Live, the directories are slightly different, making the
> configuration:
> 
> <?xml version="1.0"?>
> <!DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">
>  <fontconfig>
>    <dir>/usr/share/texmf-texlive/fonts/opentype</dir>
>    <dir>/usr/share/texmf-texlive/fonts/truetype</dir>
>    <dir>/usr/share/texmf-texlive/fonts/type1</dir>
> </fontconfig>

I'm less concerned about this than about the directories used by 
fontconfig (/etc/fonts and its subdirectories).  If you're using a 
packaged texlive, then whoever created the package is responsible for 
setting things up, so you shouldn't have to worry about it.  And if 
you're using the texlive installer, it knows the installation directory 
and can write a texlive.conf file with the right directories.

But I agree that the instructions should make this part clear, once it's 
been decided exactly what the texlive installer will do.

Ken