Akira Kakuto writes:
>> kpsewhich does not set $engine. The real engines do:
>> TEXFORMATS=.;$TEXMF/web2c/{$engine,}//
> Therefore, Olaf introduced an option --engine=STRING.
Also, it seems a good idea to have
engine = unset
in texmf.cnf just like
progname = unset
--
Olaf Weber
(This space left blank for technical reasons.)