[OS X TeX] Puzzled by epstopdf

[André Bellaïche]

> TeX needs the switch '-shell-escape' to be allowed to launch an  
> external utility. Can globally be set in texmf.cnf.
>
> --
> Greetings
>
>   Pete
>
======
>
> Howdy,
>
> Assuming you are using TeXShop you can enable \write18 (i.e., the  
> ability to execute external commands from within pdflatex ---  
> technically a dangerous thing to do but sometimes very useful) by  
> using
>
> pdflatex --shell-escape
>
> as the LaTeX command (TeXShop->Preferences->Engine tab) to use with  
> pdftex. If you'd like a warning you can check the Shell Escape  
> Warning box.
>
> Hopefully that will make it all work fine.
>
> Good Luck,
>
> Herb Schulz


Many thanks to Pete and Herb.

This opens new questions :

-- What is the default ? With or without --shell-escape ?

-- When a user changes Texshop preferences, are the preferences  
changed for that user only, or for everybody ? (I could look by  
myself, but the answer may be of use to some people.)

-- How did you come to know the meaning of "\write18", and that for  
Texshop it corresponds to "--shell-escape" ? By knowing well the TeX  
Book and Unix ? By other means ? I cannot get used to the idea that  
typing in TeX is like doing mathematics: you need to learn advanced  
calculus, higher algebra, topology, projective geometry and  
analytical functions only to understand the meaning of a correct  
statement about points of algebraic curves which be valid for every  
point (singular points as well).

André Bellaïche------------------------- Info --------------------------
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