[pdftex] installation of pdftex binaries

[Reinhard Kotucha]

>>>>> "John" == John Robert Kitchin <jkitchin at udel.edu> writes:

    > Hi, I have just finished building pdftex-14f.  The compiling
    > seemed to go well, and the binaries appear to work.  I have them
    > in /usr/local/pdftex2/src/texk/web2c right now.  I have a couple
    > of questions though,

Hi, I assume that you have teTeX installed.

    > 1.  There is no pdflatex binary, is this called by pdftex --fmt
    > pdflatex inputfile or did I miss something?

pdflatex usually is a symbolic link pointing to the pdftex binary.

    > The pdflatex file on my linux box appears to be a binary.

I suppose that you loaded the file into an editor, but just try ls -l.

    > 2. I am not certain how to update the system files and which
    > ones to update.  Replacing the pdftex binary seems obvious, but
    > there are a lot of other files in these directories.

The only file you need beside the binary is pdftex.pool.  It should go
into texmf/web2c.  You'll find the old one there but you need the new
one.  You also must update pdftex.def.  Look where the old one is on
your system.

    > 3.  If I try calling the new pdftex binary from another binary
    > as

    > pdftex --fmt pdflatex inputfile, I get an error message that it
    > can't find the fmt file.

If you have installed any new files it's always a good idea to run
"texhash" to update the filename database, though it is not really
necessary if you only replace files.

You must then run "texconfig init" which (re)creates all the format
files that are configured in texmf/web2c/fmtutil.cnf and automatically
(re)creates all the symlinks in the bin directory.

After that you should be able to use pdflatex.

    > 4.  What is the difference between getting the binaries this way
    > and the binaries that are in the zip file.  There are only a few

In which zip file?

Regards,
  Reinhard

-- 
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Reinhard Kotucha			               Phone: +49-511-751355
Berggartenstr. 9
D-30419 Hannover	              mailto:reinhard at kammer.uni-hannover.de
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Microsoft isn't the answer. Microsoft is the question, and the answer is NO.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------