[texhax] [tex-live] texmf.cnf problem for DevanagariTeX in Ubuntu904/Texlive

[Norbert Preining]

Hi,

first of all, you are reporting problems with Debian/Ubuntu TeX Live,
so the tex-live list is not the perfect place. Better to use Debian/Ubuntu
specific support forums.

Here the development of TeX Live itself is done, not the packaging 
for Debian.

There is a Ubuntu group, and a Debian mailing list for that.

Anyway, since it is mostly me being responsible fro Debian packages, see
below for comments.

On Mi, 28 Okt 2009, P. P. Narayanaswami wrote:
> file is  is to edit the texmf.cnf file (in web2c directory)
> and modify the TEXMF variable. Insert the line  
>     DEVNAG = /path/to/velthuis
> and then modify the TEXMF definition as:
>     TEXMF = {!!$DEVNAG,!!$TEXMFLOCAL,!!$TEXMFMAIN}
> Rebuild the file database.
> 
> When I do exactly as above, nothing happens and  kpathsea library is not finding

That is strange. In fact if you do that and call mktexlsr the
files should be found.

When you called mktexlsr did it lists that it updated the DEVNAG tree.

> % This file is automatically generated by update-texmf
> % PLEASE DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE DIRECTLY. It is meant to be generated from
> % files in /etc/texmf/texmf.d/.
> % While changes made by users will not be overwritten, they will cause
> % you trouble. You will be shown the differences between the edited and
> % the newly created file. We will try to merge our and your changes, but
> % that might not always work, and you will probably have to edit again.
> % Therefore, if you want a smooth upgrade, please edit the files
> % in /etc/texmf/texmf.d,
> % or create an additional one (with the extension '.cnf'),
> % and invoke update-texmf.
> 
> What does this mean?  Am I not allowed to edit and change the texmf.cnf
> file, and in that case, how can I accomplish the changes need to install
> DevanagariTeX?  Any help will be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Well that does mean what it is written!!!

texmf.cnf in Debian and thus Ubuntu is managed in two steps:
- first it is recreated from the files in /etc/texmf/texmf.d/
- then user made changes are tried to be merged with ucf

The above description explains where you should make changes.

You also could read
	/usr/share/doc/tex-common/TeX-on-Debian.{pdf,txt,html}
	/usr/share/doc/tex-common/README.Debian.{pdf,txt,html}
	/usr/share/doc/tex-common/ebian-TeX-Policy.{pdf,txt,html}
(in this order it is probably the easiest!)

Thanks.

Best wishes

Norbert

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dr. Norbert Preining                                        Associate Professor
JAIST Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology   preining at jaist.ac.jp
Vienna University of Technology                               preining at logic.at
Debian Developer (Debian TeX Task Force)                    preining at debian.org
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