[pdftex] \pdfmapfile while creating a format file (MiKTeX pdfTex 1.20a)

[Hartmut Henkel]

On Tue, 20 Jul 2004, Christian Schenk wrote:

> I have a question relating to \pdfmapfile and format file creation
> (MiKTeX pdfTeX 1.20a-rc4).
>
> Should it be possible to use the \pdfmapfile directive while creating
> a pdflatex format file? In other words, is the following practicable:
>
> pdftex -ini mypdftex.tex
>
> with mypdftex.tex:
>
> \scrollmode
> \pdfoutput=1
> \catcode`{=1
> \catcode`}=2
> \pdfmapfile{abc}
> \input latex.ltx
>
> Currently (MiKTeX 1.20a-rc4), the mapfile info doesn't make it into
> the format file, i.e., \pdfmapfile has no effect here. Is this a
> MiKTeX specific bug? Or is it by design, that we cannot compile map
> file info into the format file?

AFAIK the mapfile never made it into the format file, neither its name
nor its contents. Previously the mapfile names were specified in
pdftex.cfg, and the list of mapfiles there was read in by pdftex in ini
and non-ini mode. This is still so, only that it's now done by
\pdfmapfile{}. E. g. your example above would also allow to typeset by
pdftex -ini, using abc.map. The pdftex -ini would scan the mapfile,
typeset something, and exit. The default map file is pdftex.map. In
teTeX, mapfiles are collected by updmap, and then filled into the one
pdftex.map.

Maybe one could change the default mapfile name in ini mode by some tbd
new \pdfdefaultmapfile{} primitive, where the actual name then would be
dumped into the format. No idea how useful or complicated this would be.

Regards, Hartmut