[tex-live] ebong

[Reinhard Kotucha]

On 15 January 2011 Robin Fairbairns wrote:

 > Philip Taylor (Webmaster, Ret'd) <P.Taylor at rhul.ac.uk> wrote:
 > 
 > > Reinhard Kotucha wrote:
 > > 
 > > > You can install Python under Windows.  People usually have to install
 > > > it on every other platform too.
 > > 
 > > Is it sold by Microsoft ?  I don't like installing open-source
 > > software that I can't trust :-)
 > 
 > ho ho.  very satirical.
 > 
 > what's your aim in trying to use tex live?  is it to get tex-related
 > work done, or is it to complain that people use new-fangled languages
 > that muckrocruft are trying to ignore?
 > 
 > there really is no point in the latter, whatever.

Phil only uses software he trusts, i.e. software sold by Masosoft or
software recommended by Sebastian. 

I must admit that I'm not overly happy with scripts written in
languages other than Perl or texlua.  Perl is already installed on all
Unix systems because many system tools depend on it.  Thus, it's
sufficient to ship a Perl for Windows with TeX Live.

Python might be installed on Unix systems or not.  Some Linux
distributions depend on it because their package managers are, at
least partly, written in Python.  TeX Live contains scripts written in
Ruby, Bourne shell syntax, and so on. With this in mind one could
claim that Windows users are not discriminated because Unix users have
to install at least Ruby and maybe Python too.

On the other hand, when we discussed how to write a new installer for
TeX Live, we came to the conclusion that we have to provide a Perl for
Windows because we thought that people expect that things work
out-of-the-box.  We could as well tell Windows users to install Perl
before, but we deliberately wanted the TeX Live installer being
self-contained.

Regarding all the scripts provided by TeX Live, I fully agree with
Phil's complaints, though the TeX Live team isn't responsible for the
mess.

I assume that everybody who uploads a program to CTAN is aware that
TeX Live doesn't support anything but Perl and texlua, and that MiKTeX
doesn't even support Perl.

We already have Bourne shell scripts in TeX Live and the author
recommends to install Cygwin in order to run these scripts under
Windows.  Urghhh!

Anyway, TeX Live itself is supposed to work out-of-the-box on all
platforms, but it's impossible to control what people upload to CTAN.
I can only recommend to write scripts either in Perl or texlua if they
are supposed to work out-of-the-box in TeX Live, texlua is preferred
if they should work in MiKTeX too. 

I agree with Phil that it's unfortunate if people have to install
external software in order to run programs which are part of TeX Live.
But as far as TeX Live itself is concerned, I think that we spent a
vast amount of time already in order to make sure that it works on all
platforms in the same way.  What people upload to CTAN is another
story, and the TeX Live team has no influence.

I can only recommend to write scripts in texlua.  texlua scripts are
completely platform independent and not restricted to TeX Live, they
work under MiKTeX as well.

Regards,
  Reinhard

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Reinhard Kotucha                                      Phone: +49-511-3373112
Marschnerstr. 25
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Microsoft isn't the answer. Microsoft is the question, and the answer is NO.
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