[tex-live] Identifying the cause of slow compilation

[Philip Taylor]

Zdenek Wagner wrote:

> 2. It is not necessary to add the working directory to TEXINPUT beccause
> it is searched as the first location. If you do it, TeX will look there
> twice. If the directory contents is cached by OS, the second lookup will
> be fast. If the OS (or VM) has little space for disk cache, the second
> lookup will be as slow as the first one.

This seems not to be true.  With the following TeXMF.cnf in
\TeX\Live\2014, "Master.TeX" cannot be found (it is in the current
directory) :

> TEXINPUTS.xetex = !!$TEXMFROOT/texmf-dist/tex/{eplain,generic,plain,xetex,latex/graphics,latex/latexconfig,xelatex}//
> TEXMFLOCAL = D:/TeX/Live/TeXMF/Local
> TEXMFSYSVAR = $SELFAUTOPARENT/TeXMF/Var
> TEXMFSYSCONFIG = $SELFAUTOPARENT/TeXMF/Config
> TEXMFHOME = D:\Users\Philip TAYLOR\TeXMF
> OSFONTDIR = $SystemRoot/fonts//

[OT]  It is annoying that I have to add xelatex to the search path in
order to be able to load "xetex.cfg"; surely that file should reside in
"xetex", not "xelatex" ...

** Phil.