[tex-live] tlinfra update done

[T T]

2009/2/15 Dan Luecking <luecking at uark.edu>:
> Karl Berry (karl at freefriends.org) wrote
>
>
>
>> We updated the infrastructure packages on tlnet last night.  The new
>> versions is on tug.org now and will make its way around CTAN in due
>> course.
>>
>> Windows users should run the update-tlmgr-latest.exe recovery executable
>> to update the infrastructure packages.
>>
>> We hope this will
>> 1) fix the tex4ht-on-gnu/linux woes, and
>> 2) make updates on Windows simpler/more reliable.
>>
>> Karl
>
> I ran the update-tlmgr program (8:30pm CST, 13 Feb 09) and then
> performed
>  tlmgr update --all
> There were 34 updates, which seemed proceeded without incident
> (except for those pesky make_container messages) until the very
> end. Then there were these 6 lines of screen messages:
>
> -----
> 4NT: C:\TL2008\temp\updater-w32.bat [107] unknown command ":remove_src_doc"
> DO NOT CLOSE THIS WINDOW!
> TeX Live infrastructure update in progress
> 4NT: C:\TL2008\temp\updater-w32.bat [107] unknown command ":untar"
> 4NT: C:\TL2008\temp\updater-w32.bat [107] unknown command ":incltlpobj"
> Update complete.
> 4NT: C:\TL2008\temp\updater-w32.bat [97] unknown command "2"
> -----
>

> I see two problems with this:
>  1. No new window was opened as the second and third lines seem to
>    assume; instead the batch file updater-w32.bat appeared to run
>    in the current shell (which was 4NT.exe).

This is normal. Console window is already open by tlmgr.bat and there
no need to open new ones.

>  2. If the batch file was written exclusively for cmd.exe, then
>    cmd.exe should probably be called to run it.

OK. I will look into that. Thanks for reporting this.

> 4NT.exe is supposed to be mostly compatible with cmd.exe batch file
> syntax, but perhaps not completely. The lines that triggered errors were
> [97]  2>nul del temp\w32_tar.exe temp\__BACKUP_*

This works fine in cmd.exe.

> and
> [107] call %~1 %2 %3 %4 %5
>
> The first seems completely wrong to me, but perhaps cmd.exe accepts it.

The new batches were tested with cmd.exe and cmd.exe only. They work
properly with that interpreter. Apparently 4NT doesn't support all the
extensions introduced in NT or processes commands differently.

> The second is part of the subroutine ":foreachpkg", which is called
> with %1 equal to the commands complained about above.

This is as it should be. The first argument to ":foreachpkg" is a
command that should be executed for each package. What I don't
understand is why 4NT doesn't complain about ":foreachpkg" but it does
complain about the others. Does 4NT support calling labels as
subroutines?

> One wonders what people would experience who have their command
> line provided by a completely different shell than cmd or 4NT.

Well, I don't think it is feasible to give support for all possible
shells. People savy enough to change their default command interpreter
can be expected to deal with those kind of problems. Do you know of
any other command interpreters besides 4NT that could be used as
replacement for cmd.exe?

I will try to think of some tests to switch to cmd.exe early enough.
But I don't have 4NT to do those tests, unfortunately. Does 4NT alter
%ComSpec% variable? And does it support %cmdcmdline% dynamic variable?
I could check what shell called tlmgr.bat and act upon it. I just
worry if that can be made robust enough.

Cheers,

Tomek