[OS X TeX] MacTeX 2014 TeX Distribution panel broken under Mac OSX Yosemite RC

[John Minter]

> On Oct 5, 2014, at 6:06 PM, Richard Koch <koch at math.uoregon.edu> wrote:
> 
> 1) I installed previous betas of Yosemite on a fresh partition and used MacTeX to install
> TeX. That worked fine.
> 
> Unfortunately, I didn't try the update route, with MacTeX already installed. You report a one hour
> delay installing this way. Our other user reported a 12 hour delay. Clearly we need to investigate,
> and probably warn users that it is easier to uninstall TeX Live, update, and then do a clean install of
> MacTeX.

You are correct. I should point out I have a new MacBook Pro with a 2.3 Ghz i7 processor and a SSD, so I expect it to be fast. I would warn users of long wait times with a big /usr/local tree and give them the option deleting it and reinstalling or just waiting. My problem was the unexpected hang and concern that the installation crashed w/o error. I did see reports on Apples’s site of waits up to 40 hrs. No system info was provided.

> 
> 2) The author of the TeX Dist Pref Pane is aware of a problem, but I don't know whether
> he is working on a solution.

I appreciate the effort

> 
> However, I constructed a similar Pref Pane, which you can get at
> 
> 	http://pages.uoregon.edu/koch/LocalTeX.zip <http://pages.uoregon.edu/koch/LocalTeX.zip>
I will take a look. May take a bit, this will be a big week at work...

> 
> This zip gives you a pref pane, a pdf explaining it, and full source. This pane doesn't
> change any data used by the original pane, and can be used in conjunction with it or
> instead of it. The one disadvantage is that it puts uses as symbolic link to the binaries
> 
> 	~/Library/TeX/LocalTeX/texbin
> 
> Thus the disadvantage is that you must reconfigure your GUI apps, but the advantages are
> that
> 
> 	a) Apple sometimes removes /usr/texbin, but doesn't remove items in ~/Library
> 
> 	b) This location is user writeable, so users can have independent default TeX
> 	distributions

Understandable choices. I just use the homebrew approach and change ownership of /usr/local to my userid. This is obviously designed for personal computers… 

I should also note that I found a much easier workaround on stack overflow for the environment issue
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/25385934/yosemite-launchd-conf-no-longer-work <http://stackoverflow.com/questions/25385934/yosemite-launchd-conf-no-longer-work>
I made the AppleScript app described and set it to run on startup. Zero hassle...

> 
> Dick Koch
> koch at math.uoregon.edu <mailto:koch at math.uoregon.edu>
> PS: Did you already have the MacTeX install package, or did you download it again. I ask
> because Apple has changed signing methods and I haven't yet tested if our packages needs
> to be resigned.

I used the original installer from my backup drive. I don’t remember a signing issue; I’m so used to going into the Security Panel and allowing applications from sources (like MacTeX) that I trust that it wasn’t high on my list of things to notice....

Best regards
John Minter


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