[tex-live] mysterious mpost problem

[Thomas Esser]

> >  . Run `mpost --mem=mf2pt1 nospecial.mf'.
...
> >  mpost '&mf2pt1 \input nospecial.mf'
> 
> normally such problems are the result of a mismatch in mem values stored in 
> the mem file and those in your texmf.cnf (at least, each time i ran into 
> those special/string related issues it was related to that)

Bingo!

The following works:
  mpost --ini mf2pt1 \\dump
  mpost --mem=mf2pt1 --progname=mpost nospecial.mf
or
  mpost --mem=mf2pt1 --ini mf2pt1 \\dump
  mpost --mem=mf2pt1 nospecial.mf

The first version uses the memory settings for mpost, the second
version uses the settings for mf2pt1 (which does not explicitly exist
in texmf.cnf, so the defaults are used).

Thomas