[tex-live] texdoc.tlu (was: TeX Live Installer -- pregeneration of formats)

[Frank Küster]

Reinhard Kotucha <reinhard.kotucha at web.de> wrote:

> A stupid question: is the version of texdoc.tlu in the TeX Live
> repository up-to-date?  

I have not made any changes since ages; IIRC the last change was even
made by Norbert, and was fist done in the TL repository.

> If yes, I hope that I misunderstand the code.
>
>   -- [[ override hardcoded variables with values from texmf.cnf ]]
>   rmfile_command = set_var_from_texmf(rmfile_command,'TEXDOC_RMFILE')
>   rmdir_command = set_var_from_texmf(rmdir_command,'TEXDOC_RMDIR')
>
> There is only one texmf.cnf file for all platforms, including
> Windows.  You cannot set TEXDOC_RMFILE in texmf.cnf any more.  

Why not?

> This
> should be hard-coded in your script:
>  
>      if (os.type == "windows") then ....

It is done like this already, except that I didn't know of os.type (or
maybe it wasn't available one year ago), and do some guessing based on
the PATH separator. 

> My proposal:
>
>   * Set reasonable defaults for Unix and Windows in your script.
>
>   * Look for a config file in $TEXMFHOME.

Here you've got a point indeed: I do read texmf.cnf for site-wide
configuration, but there is no possibility at the moment to change the
behaviour on a per-user basis.

Now the question is: Should we use one (user) configuration file for
each texlua script which understands configuration settings?  Or should
there be one central file, similar to a user-specific texmf.cnf?
Personally, I prefer a per-script configuration file, but it might be
tedious if some changes need to be repeated over and over.

And where should such a file be looked for?  What about
$TEXMFHOME/scripts/config/ - the site-wide ones could then go to
$TEXMFSYSCONFIG/scripts/, err, shouldn't the user-specific path be
rather $TEXMFCONFIG/scripts/?

> It's quite late for significant changes in TeX Live 2008 but I'm very
> interested in the texlua version of texdoc.  Unless I misunderstand
> the code in the repository I fear that it doesn't work.

It should work, since texmf.cnf is just needed for local customization.

Regards, Frank
-- 
Frank Küster
Debian Developer (teTeX/TeXLive)