[OS X TeX] MacTeX - a few questions

[Axel E. Retif]

On Feb 24, 2007, at 17:00 , Richard Koch wrote:

> Folks,
>
> On Feb 24, 2007, at 2:32 PM, Peter Dyballa wrote:
>
>> MacTeX seems to be more user (= Mac owner) oriented, i-Installer  
>> is more like a system tool, like Apple's Installer (which reads  
>> from the package a description of permissions, which are also used  
>> by Disk Utility to check and repair permissions on the disk) – two  
>> worlds collide!
>
> I don't understand this paragraph.
>
> The difference between i-Installer and MacTeX is that i-Installer  
> gives the user greater control over what is installed and how it is  
> configured, while MacTeX installs without asking questions, by  
> design. Peter suggests that there are other permission-related  
> different philosophies, which isn't the case. The MacTeX installer  
> gives the /Applications/TeX folder exactly the same owner, group,  
> and permissions that Apple itself gives to /Applications. MacTeX  
> gives /usr/local/texlive exactly the same owner, group, and  
> permissions that Apple itself gives to /usr. Etc.

I really don't see what the problem is ---/Applications/TeX is owned  
by root with group admin just as /Applications/Utilities:

drwxrwxrwx    4 root     admin      136 Feb 25 00:11 TeX/
[...]
drwxrwxr-x   34 root     admin     1156 Feb 18 01:06 Utilities/

Other directories (e.g., Adobe apps) are owned by the administrator  
(I don't know why Photoshop has different group ---it's just how  
Adobe installed them):

drwxrwxrwx   15 axretif  admin      510 May 29  2005 Adobe  
Illustrator CS/
drwxrwxrwx   14 axretif  admin      476 May 29  2005 Adobe InDesign CS/
drwxrwxrwx   15 axretif  axretif    510 May 29  2005 Adobe Photoshop CS/
drwxrwxrwx    6 axretif  admin      204 Jan 22 00:43 Adobe Reader 8/

As an administrator, I have complete control over root:admin or  
axretif:admin. As I said, I repair permissions before and after  
installing software, and there hasn't been any problem with i- 
Installer or TeXLive-2007.

Best,

Axel
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