[tex-live] scheme modern

[Zdenek Wagner]

2011/1/9 Arno Trautmann <Arno.Trautmann at gmx.de>:
> Hi all,
>
> answer to Tomek's and Norbert's mail in one message:
>
> T T wrote:
>> On 8 January 2011 15:27, Arno Trautmann <Arno.Trautmann at gmx.de> wrote:
>>> As far as I can see, there are three important points to clarify:
>>>
>>> * What is the purpose of a "modern" (however we call it) scheme?
>>> * What should be in this scheme?
>>> * Can we save space at all?
>>>
>>> * First point is easy as it is my personal reason: I give introductory
>>> curses at the university (as a regular course, i.e. 3 months with sheets
>>> and ECTS-credit points) that goes quite beyond "type this and you get
>>> that". This summer, it will be based on luaLaTeX and therefore I thought
>>> it would be nice for the beginners not to have to install the full
>>> scheme but a somewhat (as much as possible) smaller installation without
>>> loosing any functionality - of course without the possibility to compile
>>> old documents. For that, they can upgrade to full.
>>> The intention is to keep the necessary number of files as small as possible.
>>
>> Would such a scheme have a broader appeal beyond your course?  We are
>> obviously not going to introduce an additional scheme just for your
>> specialized course!
>
> Of course, and I would not have asked in that case! It was just the
> reason I came up with this idea having in mind it could be useful for
> every LaTeX beginner or everyone who only works with "modern" things.
> The question was *not* for my personal needs! Otherwise I would have
> proceeded as Norbert suggests:
>
> Norbert Preining wrote:
>> Why don't you:
>> 1. start with a minimal scheme
>> 2. add what you need (or you think you need)
>> 3. test all your examples, code you provide, etc, if something is missing,
>>    go to point 2.
>> 4. tell your students:
>>    - please install scheme-minimal plus the following packages: ...
>> ?
>
> Because that would be ok for my personal course, but not for the other
> users out there. It was for them that I was asking.
> For the course, I think I might proceed that way, might be interesting
> to grow the LaTeX-setup step by step :)
>
>>> I hope I have made my points a bit clearer so the discussion can go into
>>> a straight direction.
>>
>> The straight answer is: Nobody knows until you try it out yourself!
>
> Ok, so from your answes I conclude: There is not much
> interest/necessarity/possibility to provide a smallish "modern" scheme.
>
As I wrote, if size is the main concern, then you should remove fonts
and documentation. However, if the students are supposed to create
beautiful documents, fonts are needed. If the students are supposed to
create real documents, they need package documentation. It is always
useful it you can type "texdoc packagename" and you see the manual. I
use LaTeX since 1991 and still look to manuals a few times a week.
Thus the space you save would be almost negligible.

If installation time is the main concern, then a better solution is
available. Just create a local mirror in your university and instruct
the students to install over the LAN within your university. The
computer in my office sits on the gigabit backbone and installation of
scheme full from a nearby mirror (some 5 km apart) takes about 10
minutes. You can also explain them how to copy the TL tree on a DVD or
USB disk to their home computers and finish the installation by "tlmgr
postaction". I use this way to install TL on my home computer where it
would take more than an hour over a slow ADSL connection.

Using this method your students will acquire some useful knowledge and
you will save your time thinking about what to delete. And the
students will be able to process "old" documents created by someone
else.

> Maybe I'll come back to this in a few months if I have more concret
> suggestions ando some testing, so far,
>
> thanks for all the answers and your time,
>
> cheers
> Arno
>
>



-- 
Zdeněk Wagner
http://hroch486.icpf.cas.cz/wagner/
http://icebearsoft.euweb.cz