[tex-live] Question for Windows

Berend Hasselman bhh at xs4all.nl
Wed May 23 19:42:27 CEST 2007


Hi

I wish to discuss with TeX Live the following matter.
My apologies if I shouldn't have sent this mail to this address.

I maintain or have maintained a MiKTeX installation at my work  
(government agency in The Hague).
This is currently version 2.4.
The basics of the installation are:

The MiKTeX root is located on a file-server  on K:\tex\tex
An additional root holding all our style files and some font  
definitions is located on K:\tex\cpbtex.
Finally each user has a local root located on a different drive:  G: 
\private\appdata\localtexmf

I did not want MiKTeX to keep these directories in the Windows registry.
I made use of the not or badly  documented option of listing these  
directories in a file paths.ini in a special place.
All of this works but there is a problem with how MiKTeX treats the  
different roots.
MiKTeX keeps track of files using a filename database for each of its  
roots. The databases are stored in the local user root.

The MiKTeX method has changed slightly in the new version 2.5.
But it still stores all filename databases in the or a  local user root.

This is very unpleasant when changes are made to the MiKTeX or the  
CPB root (k:\tex\cpbtex).
The filename databases for all users have to be changed/updated,  
which can be done automatically but is very annoying.

One of the reasons users like MiKTeX is Yap which can be configured  
to call your editor at a specified place in an input file.

My questions about  Tex Live for Windows are:

1. Where does TeX Live keep its "filename database" stuff (ls-R  
stuff) in a Windows installation?
    (Same method as in Unix/Linux and Mac OS X: ls-R files are kept  
in each root/tree separately?)
   (With the Unix method updating the main root or the CPB root is  
easy and hassle free).

2. I gather that dviout is the equivalent of Yap. Does it also  
support "inverse search" (jumping back to your editor to a specified  
line)?

3. do you feel that TeX Live is the better solution for a network/ 
fileserver installation?

I sincerely hope that you will be able to enlighten me and provide  
some guidance.

my regards

Berend Hasselman
NTG/TUG member
Netherlands

PS. At home I have an iMac and Mac OS X. I am extremely satisfied  
with MacTeX/TeX Live and the way it works with TeXShop.
My compliments to everybody.
It is the way this works that has prompted me to consider TeX Live  
for my office which still uses Windows.





More information about the tex-live mailing list