[tex-live] LuaLaTeX potential problems

[Petr Olsak]

On Sat, 14 May 2016, David Carlisle wrote:

> On 14 May 2016 at 07:10, Petr Olsak <petr at olsak.net> wrote:
>>
>> Hello,
>>
>> I did try (only coincidentally) following document
>>
>> \documentclass[varwidth]{standalone}
>> \begin{document}
>> Nazdar.
>> \end{document}
>>
>> processed by LuaLaTeX. It doesn't work with new LuaTeX where \pdfpagewidth
>> primitive isn't accesible (in TeXlive pretest).
>>
>> There are thousands LaTeX packages and classes, they may be used in LuaLaTeX
>> document. IMHO, there is very hight probability of problems simlilar like
>> this. I don't understand why LuaLateX doesn't load luatex85.sty by default
>> when it is generated.
>
> Hi, yes as Karl pointed out on a message to this list at the start of 
> the tl2016 pretest texlive "just" distributes what is provided to ctan, 
> so this is the wrong list for package or luatex error reports.

Hi, this is interesting idea: "TeXlive is only a collection of CTAN 
software". In such case and without more communication, it is very 
probably a software which doesn't work. I know that all authors are only 
volunteers, so we cannot want more.

>From average user point of view: a part of TeXlive (LuaLaTeX with some 
package) doesn't work but it worked in previous version of TeXlive => 
new TeXlive is wrong. He/she don't distinguish more details (what engine, 
what package, what author etc.).

I was a idealist: All authors of packages were informed about luatex 
changes and there was sufficiency time to test new versions of such 
packages in TL pretest. Before the deadline when TeXlive will be frozen (I 
mean "frozen" in this sense: it will be propagated to Linux distros, where 
it will be one year unchanged typically, or it will be saved to a DVD). 
Now, near the deadline, I did *only one accidental* test with LaTeX 
(normally I don't use LaTeX) and huh: there is a problem.

Karl Berry informed me (as package writer) about luatex changes at Dec. 
15. I was convinced that others package writers were informed too. So the 
decision in LaTeX team about concept in LuaLaTeX were done many months 
ago. And now, all these changes were comprehesively tested. IMHO, without 
such communication isn't possible to distribute working TeXlive.

> Perhaps more importantly it doesn't fix many packages where the
> breakage is in lua code where the node library interfaces have changed
> a lot.

OT:
Yes, I know this problem:) My luafonts.tex (which is an alternative of 
luaotfload.sty) lost its functionality and I wasn't informed about it from 
lua developers. It happened about 1 year ago. More communications between 
developers can avoid such problems, maybe.

Best regards

Petr Olsak