[OS X TeX] altpdflatex - back compatibility please

[Jung-Tsung Shen]

Herb,

Thanks for the constant kind and detailed help.

On 10/11/05, Herbert Schulz <herbs at wideopenwest.com> wrote:
>
> The TL2005 update has updated packages, etc., so it will be good to
> update. For someone that doesn't want to have to ``fix things up''
> during the transition period I'd wait a short while. I think that
> when the next version of TeXShop comes out and you check it out
> everything else will be stable enough so updating will go smoothly.
> If things are working for you now there is no reason to rush in until
> the dust settles.
>

Guess this means "No, you don't have to upgrade if your TeX system is
running fine." ;-)

>
> You might want to look into the TCOBrowser. It has the ability to
> download and expand MikTeX packages. It is even possible to set
> things up so that new packages get installed in your personal texmf
> tree (~/Library/texmf/) so they should just work; I haven't tried
> that --- I have it set to expand onto my desktop.
>

Thanks for the info. on TCOBrowser. I did look at it before from the
suggestion on this mailing list. There's still differences: in MikTeX,
it's one step process. Imagine this: in your document, you put
\usepackage{geometry}, because either you copy/get some lines in your
document from the Internet/friends and you are instructed to include
this package. When you compile your document, a friendly windows pops
up and asks: "Howdy, you don't have the package `geometry' installed,
would you like me to do that for you?" After the permission is
granted, it goes ahead to get it, expand it, and installs it in fly,
and the compilation continues. A few seconds later, you see your
beautiful masterpiece in PDF.

Another not-very-good analogy is (don't ask me why I am giving an
analogy which I know is not good ...) TiVo and traditional VCR tape.
On TiVo, you find whatever programs you like, just press buttons and
TiVo records for you. If you are using the traditional VCR, most of
the time, you might get lazy by just thinking of the "rewinding",
"changing" the tape, and decide not to record the programs instead,
even though admittedly these steps are just very easy steps.

JT
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