[XeTeX] long search time when font doesn't exist

[Andreas Matthias]

Ulrike Fischer wrote:

> if I try to use a font that doesn't exist (e.g. because I mistype the
> name) then xelatex stops for about a minute while the hard drive is
> quite busy. Then I get the expected "tfm missing" error. 

Could it be that you haven't got a font cache, or at least not an
up-to-date one? Try to regenerate the cache. Under unix it is:

# fc-cache --force

> \documentclass{article}
> 
> \font\x="Myriad Proxx"
> \begin{document}
> \x xx
> \end{document}

Here it takes 1.0s if the font is found, 2.4s if it is not found
and 14.6s if I delete the cache files in /var/cache/fontconfig
and ~/.fontconfig.


Ciao
Andreas