[metapost] I cannot use metapost (mpost)

[Reinhard Kotucha]

On 2014-04-04 at 17:38:29 -0400, John Kitzmiller wrote:

 > On Apr 4, 2014, at 5:23 AM, - <wja.maaskant at quicknet.nl> wrote:
 > 
 > >  I am trying to compose a lecture, by means of metapost
 > >  figures. I use a linux computer with UBUNTU, and composed a file
 > >  example.mp as is described in a paper of Andr'e Heck on
 > >  "Learning Metapost by doing" , NTG vol.32,2005. When as
 > >  prescribed, I typed 'mpost example' I got the message: sudo
 > >  apt-get install texlive - binaries. After some time Texlive was
 > >  loaded and again I typed 'mpost example'. Now I got the message:
 > >  Sorry, I can't find the 'mpost' preload file, will try
 > >  'plain'. And then: I can't find the 'plain' preload file!
 > > 
 > > How should I proceed to use metapost? Thanks, when you can help me.
 > > 
 > > Wim Maaskant --
 > > http://tug.org/metapost/
 > 
 > 
 > You may need to add texlive folder to your PATH?

 I wouldn't expect that you have to do anything after running

   apt-get install texlive

If you get the error messages "Sorry, I can't find the 'mpost' preload
file, will try 'plain'." or "I can't find the 'plain' preload file!"
then mpost is already in PATH (the error messages obviously come from
mpost) and something else is wrong.

I'm clueless.  Ubuntu is a descendant of Debian and I assume that it
inherited the Debian package management tools.  I have two Raspberries
running Debian and everything works out-of-the-box like a charm.

It's probably necessary to investigate the fmtutil.cnf files in this
particular case.

Regards,
  Reinhard

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Reinhard Kotucha                                      Phone: +49-511-3373112
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