[XeTeX] XeTeX, XeTeXpicfile, and counter-intuitive behaviour

[Heiko Oberdiek]

On Thu, Dec 01, 2011 at 03:03:32PM +0000, Philip TAYLOR wrote:

> Heiko Oberdiek wrote:
> 
> >D.E. Knuth, "The TeXbook": "Chapter 15: How TeX Makes Lines into Pages":
> >
> >| Whenever TeX is moving an item from the top of the "recent
> >| contributions" to the bottom of the "current page," it discards
> >| a discardable item (glue, kern, or penalty) if the current
> >| page does not contain any boxes.
> 
> Jonathan Kew, Will Robertson, or any other XeTeX documenter :
> "XeTeXpicfile is a discardable item" ???

No, it's a whatsit. It is *not* discarded, but it isn't a box.

> >>Problem 2 (completely intractable) : XeTeX claims to be unable to find
> >>"TAR-2.pdf",
> >
> >Already answered (\XeTeXpdffile).
> 
> I repeat : "Why does \XeTeXpicfile say
> 
> 	'! Unable to load picture or PDF file"',
> 
> if it is unable to handle PDF files ?

Then it cannot load PDF files and the error message is correct.

> >Make a minimal example that shows the problem.
> 
> To follow : I have to remove cropmarks and
> various other things essential to the real work.

Then my guess is that the problem is caused by the removal
code for the crop marks and the various other things.

Yours sincerely
  Heiko Oberdiek