[XeTeX] Where download Vanilla XeTeX

[Jonathan Kew]

On 10 Aug 2008, at 4:40 PM, Neale Hirsh wrote:

> Friends
>
> I need to download a copy of XeTeX/Mac that is _not_ embedded in a  
> 700 MB file. (The download is too expensive  for me and many other  
> people that I know.) Do you know where I can find a copy?

Currently, I am not building binary packages, as most people get XeTeX  
included with a major TeX distribution, and maintaining an installer  
that can work with all the various distributions is a hassle. (What  
TeX setup are you using?)

If you don't want to download a full TeX Live or MacTeX package --  
yes, I know it's huge -- you could build xetex from source (see the  
"XeTeX for Linux" page on scripts.sil.org for a pointer to source code).

Alternatively, you could get the "BasicTeX" package from Dick Koch,  
which is about a 40MB download (see http://www.uoregon.edu/~koch/).  
This includes XeTeX, as well as pdfTeX, LaTeX, etc. I'm not sure how  
recently it has been updated, though; it's possible that it has a  
slightly old version. I expect Dick will probably update it once TeX  
Live 2008 is finalized.

Another possibility is the "minimal" distribution for ConTeXt, which  
also includes XeTeX. See http://wiki.contextgarden.net/ 
ConTeXt_Minimals for information. Although this is intended for  
ConTeXt users, the actual binaries would be independent of the macro  
package, and you could presumably install them into another existing  
TeX distribution.

Finally, consider joining the TeX Users Group! The DVD of software  
that members receive as one of the benefits will include XeTeX, as  
well as many other resources.

JK