[metapost] Metafun + plainLuaTeX/LuaLaTeX

[Hans Hagen]

On 31-7-2011 12:03, Arno Trautmann wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> maybe this question is a really stupid one, but I hope someone of you
> can help me: I'd like to learn MetaFun; however, I don't want to use it
> with ConTeXt, but with plainLuaTeX or LuaLaTeX, using LuaTeXs mplib. As
> far as I understood, MetaFun is a format for MetaPost and therefore I
> thought it should be independent of the TeX format used – is this true?
> Or does ConTeXt offer additional stuff on format level that are
> necessary for using MetaFun?
> Finally, if one can use MetaFun with plainLuaTeX – how to do so on a
> (Linux x86_64) TeX live 2011? In TeX live 2010, I find the file
> metafun.mp from which I guess it is the format for MetaPost.
>
> As you see, I have basically no idea what I need in order to get MetaFun
> working – I'll be very thankful for any hints where to start …

Quite some of the metafun macros are generic but there are also a couple 
of extensions that work only with ConTeXt and some even only with 
ConTeXt mkiv (the luatex version). Of course I could make most generic 
but it's not worth the trouble and it would cripple further development.

However, you can make independent metafun graphics as follows. Make a 
file, say test.tex:

\startTEXpage
   metafun code
\stopTEXpage

Then run

   context test.tex

and you will get a graphic that you can include in whatever tex macro 
package. So, you only need to know two context commands.

Hans

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