[tex-live] acrotex files

[Manuel Pégourié-Gonnard]

Philip TAYLOR a écrit :
>> As a general rule, everything in Tl only depend on things that are
>> also included
>> in TL, so that they are immediately usable without adding anything
>> external.
> 
> I do not wish to seem flippant, but as far as I can see, /nothing/ in TeX
> Live would be usable without an external operating system, hardware,
> firmware, etc.

Yes, and that's why we pragmatically don't care for this kind of external
dependency (we wouldn't develop software otherwise, would we?)

> However, reliance on some external component did not seem to
> lie at the core of Karl's assertion : rather, he stated that (in his belief)
> the problem lay in the fact that AcroTeX depended on an external program
> (Adobe Acrobat) <stress> that was non-free</>.
> 
To be clear: I wasn't trying to explain Karl's position, but mine.

And I mentioned that IMO, while it is sometimes ok to depend on external
programs as an exception, each and every case cannot be an exception, and
depending on something non-free is a bad point for getting an exception

> No, I do not ask for an exception to be made for AcroTeX; rather, I ask the
> TeX Live team to be consistent 

We are. All packages depending on something non-free (besides the underlying OS)
are excluded from TL. This is a rather simple rule.

> if it is OK to supply binaries for a
> non-free platform (Windows), then it is also OK to supply tools to support
> non-free as-in-libre programs such as Adobe Acrobat.
> 
Not necessarily. Please admit that not supporting non-free operating systems
would have much greater consequences than excluding acrotex. Again, an operating
system is not exactly like any other software component...

> If you and the other members of the TeX Live team wish TeX Live to evolve in
> such a way that it is of use only to systems composed entirely of
> free-as-in-libre software,

I don't, and I don't think any of us do, and I guess you are perfectly aware of
our efforts in supporting windows.

> then that is indeed your choice.  But if, on the
> other hand, you are happy for TeX Live to continue to target non-free
> platforms such as Microsoft Windows, then I cannot see how you can
> legitimately seek to exclude a component such as AcroTeX that also targets a
> non-free as-in-libre program such as Adobe Acrobat.

Windows is and OS, Adobe Reader is not.

By the way, this policy in TL is not new.

> ethnic cleansing,

Hmm... not that far from a Godwin point.

Manuel.