[OS X TeX] Questions about a clean? install

[Gerben Wierda]

On Oct 7, 2006, at 19:56 , Josep M. Font wrote:

> El 07/10/2006, a las 15:05, McGarry Vince escribió:
>
>> I selected no personal configuration and the old behavior for  
>> updmap, etc. I ran an old Plain TeX file using Computer Modern  
>> fonts, only, which proceeded to create the directory /private/var/ 
>> tmp/texfonts/ in which it installed some files.
>>
>> I then added my personal files and LaTeXed a document using only  
>> Lucida fonts (confirmed by looking at the document properties for  
>> embedded fonts in Reader) and once again some files were added to / 
>> private/var/tmp/texfonts/.
>
> Surprise! I looked, and yes, I also have this folder, which  
> contains stuff called "jknapen" and files seemingly related to  
> "ecrm", etc. fonts. The creation date of this folder is, IIRC, the  
> date of my *first* TeX installation (standard i-Installer +  
> TeXShop) in this *new* machine.
>
>> What are these? And in a properly operating system should these be  
>> created?
>
> I would also like to know...

AFAIK

/var/tmp/texfonts is used to stire generated tfm, pk, etc files, all  
stuff that can be easily recreated from source (e.g. tfm from mf).  
Missing stuff is generated by TeX when possible. This makes the  
distribution smaller (no need to ship all pk, etc.). /var/tmp/ 
texfonts is more or less a cache of easily regenerated files. Its  
main intended use is the storage of pk files.

 From the kpathsea doc:

> If none of the options below are enabled, mktexpk, mktextfm, and  
> mktexmf follow the
> following procedure to decide where fonts should be installed. Find  
> the tree where the font’s
> sources are, and test the permissions of the ‘fonts’ directory of  
> that tree to determine
> whether it is writable. If it is, put the files in the tree in  
> appropriate locations. If it isn’t
> writable, see whether the tree is a system tree (named in  
> SYSTEXMF). If so, the VARTEXFONTS
> tree is used. In all other cases the working directory is used.

So, the result of using this cache is that generated files are not  
removed when you update your TeX. This speeds up things (especially  
for those using pk fonts, I guess)

G
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