TeXLive distribution and macports

[pagani laurent]

Mojca,

Thanks for the detailed explanations.

> 
> I would say that a lot more reasonable would to switch to ConTeXt and
> then you don't really need much beyond perhaps 100 or 200 MB :)

hum, good to know indeed. There are so many variants, one never know which one to pick.Why MacPorts is not using ConTeXt rather than TexLive then ? Manpower, I guess...

> No, 3,5 GB is not entirely reasonable either; a factor of two doesn't
> really change the fact that TeX Live is to a great extent an
> uncensored monster.

agreed. I was living with the 2011 version (on /usr/local) which was ”only” 1.5 Gb, it seems to be growing fast.

> He clearly explained that the version provided by MacPorts is way too
> outdated for his needs (it's only updated once per year).
> For a while in the past I also kept updating (another) TeX
> distribution several times per day, so I can totally relate to the
> situation.
> Think of an imaginary distribution like OpenDarwin that would only
> update package definitions from MacPorts once per year, and even then
> with about a month of delay.

I have no idea why one needs to update Tex distribution several times a day or even every week. AFAIAC, I have been working with the 2011 version until this morning without any trouble. I ”simply” write papers with Latex. Anyway, since I found that without installing TexLive in MacPorts it was indeed installed and occupying 1.5 Gb, I thought it was better to stick to that more recent one and remove the old 2011 version. But it was not a clever move because explicitly installing it doubled its size, so in the end I save no room. :-(
I guess I should explore the ConTeXt option and follow the recipe to tell MacPort to use that one.

>> (I did not find a version provided by Apple on my 10.12.6)
> 
> Apple does not provide any TeX distribution.

It was mentioned in one of the mails though, am I wrong ?

>> However I have one question :
>> 
>> I have a pair of .sty files which I would like my Latex editer (TexStudio) to automatically find. The simplest way is to add a /local/myfiles.sty in /opt/local/share/texmf-texlive/tex/latex as I used to do with my former texlive in /usr/local but I am afraid this might be erased each time I upgrade MacPorts. Am I wrong ?
> 
> It depends on how you update MacPorts. Just running "sudo port upgrade
> outdated" will not overwrite those files, but when you migrate to a
> new OS version, you might at some point manually run "rm -rf
> /opt/local" which will have that effect, yes.

Fair enough. Migrating to a new OS is always a mess, so a little more or a little less, no big deal.

> However, TeX is meant to support this scenario in a much better way.
> You should generally use one of these two:
>    kpsexpand '$TEXMFLOCAL'
>    kpsexpand '$TEXMFHOME'
> The second one usually resolves to ~/Library/texmf and I would
> probably use that one if I was you (of course you need a subfolder
> tex/latex/ if you have some latex styles) unless you want to install
> the files for other users as well (in that case you would go for
> TEXMFLOCAL).

Thanks. I did not know that. I will try that.

> 
>> Is there a way to protect this subdirectory (chmod to r+a would be ignored ?)
> 
> If you ever run "sudo rm -rf /opt/local", such "protection" won't
> help.

of course.

> Uninstalling packages will only remove files which belong to a
> particular package, so generally your files should not be deleted. But
> /opt/local/share/texmf-texlive is the wrong folder to use anyway.

Thanks for the advice.

Laurent

"S'il n'y a pas de solution, c'est qu'il n'y a pas de problème" (devise Shadok)