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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Kirill Balunov wrote:<br>
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<blockquote type="cite" cite="mid:CABwCVQDNgVV+otOHdMGjodS__A=DwT39Dt9b_RXtjveAMwtqZw@mail.gmail.com">
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<div>Philip thank you! I agree with your comments about ambiguity, also `TeX --help` has a comment about starting with a `backslash`, I'm ok with it. But there is a tiny little dot (full stop) in the beginning of my examples, and I expect
<span class="gmail-tlid-translation gmail-translation" lang="en"><span title="" class="gmail-">it should be enough to dispel ambiguity -> I worte `TeX
<b>.</b>\some\file.tex` and not <span class="gmail-tlid-translation gmail-translation" lang="en">
<span title="" class="gmail-">`TeX \some\file.tex` without a dot, does this make sense to you?</span></span></span></span><br>
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It makes perfect sense, Kirill, but unfortunately it does not (cannot) do what you expect (or would wish). "TeX .\some\file.tex" will be parsed as :<br>
<br>
TeX (operating system command)<br>
"." (file to be processed by TeX)<br>
"\some" (TeX command)<br>
"\file" ( – ditto – )<br>
".tex" (characters to be typeset).<br>
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You can see that this is true by typing (at your operating system's command-line interpreter prompt)<br>
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TeX .\show\the.tex<br>
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Assuming that a file "..tex" does not exist within TeX's input path, you should receive :<br>
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<blockquote type="cite">TeX .\show\the.tex<br>
This is TeX, Version 3.14159265 (TeX Live 2019/W32TeX) (preloaded format=tex)<br>
! I can't find file `.'.<br>
<to be read again><br>
\show<br>
<*> .\show<br>
\the.tex<br>
(Press Enter to retry, or Control-Z to exit)<br>
Please type another input file name: <br>
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Now create "..tex" in your current directory and populate it with the single line "\relax". Now try again. This time you should receive :<br>
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<blockquote type="cite">TeX .\show\the.tex<br>
This is TeX, Version 3.14159265 (TeX Live 2019/W32TeX) (preloaded format=tex)<br>
(./..tex)<br>
> \the=\the.<br>
<*> .\show\the<br>
.tex<br>
?<br>
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and if you then enter "s" (for scroll mode) followed by "\end" you should get a DVI file containing the typeset characters ".tex"<br>
Philip Taylor<br>
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