[OS X TeX] Is this geometry behavior correct?

[Peter Dyballa]

Am 06.04.2007 um 09:32 schrieb Bruno Voisin:

> So it seems the XeLaTeX-tailored geometry.cfg is read in all cases.

Yes, that's true, at least for TeX Live 2007. And this *is* a bug!  
And the bug sits in /usr/local/texlive/2007/texmf/web2c/texmf.cnf  
quite a few times:

	TEXINPUTS.latex         = .;$TEXMF/tex/{latex,generic,}//

	% Earlier entries override later ones, so put this last.
	TEXINPUTS               = .;$TEXMF/tex/{$progname,generic,}//

The last comma adds nothing to the path as established until then, so  
it allows to search in $TEXMF/tex/// – too general! And there are  
even more such issues. This is the same situation as in gwTeX,  
actually – with one difference:

	/usr/local/gwTeX/texmf.texlive/tex/latex/geometry/geometry.cfg

is found first. This file is in the systematic gwTeX tree, so it gets  
deleted upon update, and hopefully restored, too. In TeX Live 2007 no  
such file seems to exist, so the XeTeX version of geometry.cfg is  
found first. We could try an imitation:

	sudo mkdir -p /usr/local/texlive/texmf-local/tex/kpsewhich
	sudo cat /usr/local/texlive/2007/texmf-dist/doc/latex/geometry/ 
geometry.cfg | sed -e 's;^%%\(\\ExecuteOptions{\)a4paper,\(dvips}\); 
\1letter,\2;' > /usr/local/texlive/texmf-local/tex/kpsewhich/ 
geometry.cfg
	sudo texhash

The last but one command offers the option to set a default paper for  
dvips, or leave it away, Then the cryptic "\1letter,\2" should simply  
be "\1\2". Those who want to record ISO A4 paper would need to  
substitute the word "letter" with a4paper, or change the whole  
command to:

	sudo cat /usr/local/texlive/2007/texmf-dist/doc/latex/geometry/ 
geometry.cfg | grep ExecuteOptions | sed -e 's;^%%\(\\ExecuteOptions 
\);\1;' > /usr/local/texlive/texmf-local/tex/kpsewhich/geometry.cfg

Works!

Could this also be an alternative to the Mac TeX setup for default  
paper size?


Explanation of the sudo commands:

	1.) Create the missing directory /usr/local/texlive/texmf-local/tex/ 
kpsewhich
	2.) Create an enabled geometry.cfg file in it
	3.) Renew the ls-R hash files

--
Greetings

   Pete

“One cannot live by television, video games, top ten CDs, and dumb  
movies alone”
       (Amiri Baraka 1999)



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