UKTeX V88 #08 DosTeX Compressed files? -Z-TAR-UUCP! Pick a number... Are we up to $10.24 yet?... SliTeX AMSFonts with DVILASER/HP More probs --------------------------------- Editor Peter Abbott For non VMS users Laurie Benfield has created pcwritex.boo from pcwritex.arc I have added the group tex.dvidis (preview on vaxstation). There has been some minor changes in other areas of the Archive. I shall be away from the University until April 11 and will only have limited access to my mailbox so there will be some delay before the next digest appears. --------------------------------- Date: 22-MAR-1988 10:35:23 From: MARIA@UK.AC.PCL.MOLE To: INFO-TEX@UK.AC.ASTON A few issues ago I said that I had ordered DosTeX from Gary Beihl, announced as a public domain TeX for PC's. I also said that if it looked all right I would give a copy to the Aston archive. Well my copy arrived and I am very pleased with it. Only executables are supplied and they all work fine. The distribution comes with a set of basic fonts in pk format, an Epson driver adapted from Nelson Beebe's dvixxx family and latex and amstex and a set of style files and such like. It must be the easiest public domain installation of TeX that I have ever met. I compared it with the Common TeX virtex.exe supplied by Laurie Benfield with his Hercules previewer, and although DosTeX needed more space to run (at least 599,100k so out go all your memory resident utilities) it handled bigger files than Common TeX could. It also handled proper DOS pathnames which Common TeX as supplied did not. Another plus, it fixes the Beebe dvieps problem so that it handles segmented memory properly. The hitch as far as Aston goes is that the following is Gary Beihl's policy: --------------------------------------------------------------------------- DosTeX COPYING POLICY The redistribution policy for DosTeX is similiar to the Unix Tex distribution: Is it proper for a DosTeX recipient to give DosTeX to other sites? It is to the advantage of a site to get the distribution from us rather than from another site. There are three reasons for this. First, when a site requests the distribution from us, we have a record of who has the software. We are therefore able to contact them if we discover a major bug or to announce new versions of the software or the macro packages (this, incidentally, is also an excellent reason for every site to join the TeX Users' Group). Stanford receives a few telephone calls each week from people with out of date versions of TeX which have developed problems. Since these people have been out of touch with the more recent TeX developments, they've been unaware of the previous detection and resolution of their problems. Second, when a site contacts us for the DosTeX floppies, they then know who to contact to report any problems they may run into. Third, a site receiving floppies from us knows that they are receiving a complete distribution. On the other hand, it is undesirable and unnecessary to require that multiple computers at the same location each request a separate copy of the distribution, particularly when the same individual is responsible for installing and maintaining TeX on each of these machines. Additionally, our understanding of Stanford's intentions is that the software is available to be freely redistributed and that the copyright notices appearing on some of the software are intended to prohibit misrepresentation of modified versions of the software (as being, for example, TeX) not to restrict distribution. ------------------------------------------------------------ Because of this I didn't like to just give a copy to the archive. I have written and asked him for permission to do so. In the meantime you can order a copy from Electronetics, Incorporated c/o Gary Beihl 119 Jack Rabbit Run Round Rock TX 78664 USA They won't accept an order without cash and it costs US$85 for people outside the USA (US$75 inside). Maria Tuck Polytechnic of Central London --------------------------------- Date: 22-MAR-1988 11:42:41 GMT From: SHW_F@UK.AC.LEICESTER.VAX To: ABBOTT@UK.AC.ASTON Dear Peter, I have been trying to access some of the files in the subdirectories PAVEL and have noticed that they are in a compressed format. I am transfering them to a VAX. How do I uncompress them on the VAX. I have tried in some of the readme files with out luck. Thanks Hugo Korwaser +++Editor - Please see later article +++ --------------------------------- Date: 22 Mar 88 21:55:04 gmt From: G.Toal @ uk.ac.edinburgh Subject: -Z-TAR-UUCP! To: abbottp@uk.ac.aston.mail cc: phrkf@uk.ac.warwick.cu, gtoal@uk.co.acorn Message-ID: <22 Mar 88 21:55:04 gmt 050434@EMAS-A> Dear Peter, I note that there has been the odd bit of trouble with binary files on the archive; even (as Ian Stroud points out) text files are not immune once they have been Compress-ed. My feeling is that we could do away with binary files altogether, if we had a reliable mechanism of converting ascii-text-only files to and from binary at recipients sites. Unix users gave up the binary battle a long time ago and decided to use an ascii encoding for almost everything: the program is called uuencode (there is a uudecode too...) and is simple enough that between us we could get versions running on any system you care to name. The encoding used is 3 bytes -> 4 bytes, so file sizes expand by 33%. This is the price of portability... If used in conjunction with the Lempel-Zif compress program, though, the overhead usually disappears. (You compress first, then uuencode it). I can supply a public domain version of Compress in C to anyone who needs one. I don't have a public-domain version of uuencode to hand, but if Peter thinks it is worthwhile trying tha route I can soon knock one up! Another issue in this file-transfer business is the question of aggregate file-transfers: on the system I use it is very tedious indeed to fetch files one-by-one, especially if each one has to be renamed on receipt (as most unix files do...). I would advocate the use of unix tar format files to store larger numbers of small files. The format of a file to be fetched would then be Group of files is locally 'tar'red into a single file. (files can be text or binary) File is then run through 'compress'. Compressed file (now binary even if it wasn't before) is uuencoded. so a file stored on the archive would have a name like "iptex.tar.z.u" ! Does this scheme sound sensible to those of us out there who have never seen a Unix nor ever want to? I should add that none of the machines I run on are Unices, but I have access to all the filters mentioned above. It would of course be easier if everyone had a C compiler - if someone doesn't that might scupper the scheme... The biggest stumbling block is that the tar-unpacking program has to be written per machine; the other two can be fairly portable. (Do any VMS-vaxes already have a Tar program?) Comments please? Graham. --------------------------------- Received: from acorn by kestrel.Ukc.AC.UK with UUCP id aa11232; 23 Mar 88 20:08 GMT Received: by acorn.UUCP (5.51/4.7) id AA26952; Wed, 23 Mar 88 17:33:56 GMT Message-Id: <8803231733.AA26952@acorn.UUCP> To: info-tex@uk.ac.aston Cc: gtoal@uucp.acorn Subject: Pick a number... Date: Wed,23 Mar 1988.18:04:09 From: GToal@uucp.acorn Hello fellow TeX-friends, I'm in a bit of a quandry; can anyone offer advice: I've almost completed a port of TeX to the Acorn Archimedes machines. (Works on the big 440 machines; doesn't fit on the smaller 310 machines yet) Once I have a clean system for release to the world, I'd like to supply it to the TeX community. Although I'm in the software business, I'm quite happy to follow the spirit of the TeX community and only charge for copying and for the disks. (Although I am working on a previewer which I might sell for cash at a later date...) The trouble is, I have had a fair bit of exposure to the Acorn computing world, and I know what happens when you release something like this on cheap: people who have no more experience of computing than using very low-level BBC Micro word processors hear about it and order a copy. They almost certainly won't have a TeXbook and will quickly start hassling me for info and support etc. - which is not what I want to offer - at least not for the cost of a couple of floppy disks... I just want to make it available to people like ourselves who know what they are doing, or to committed new TeX users who have bought the book and know what to expect. Part of my worry is that there are so many disks to copy: although a run-only system could, I think, be squeezed onto three or perhaps even two disks, the complete source tape will take up over a dozen disks even when everything has been through the compress utility... - and part of the TeX distribution ethic is that you should make the source available to all who ask. So my questions are, A) at what level is it legitimate to set a price for this TeX port to discourage kiddies from ordering it just because it is cheap (Media cost is about a pound per disk) - because I can well imagine the level of orders being high enough to keep me copying disks for hours every day... and B) Is it acceptable to supply run-only binaries and thus cut down the disk count, or am I obliged to supply all 12+ disks to everyone who orders? Graham. P.S. How do companies like UniTeX get away with charging hundreds of pounds for TeX? Do they claim to have written their own version completely independently of Knuth's or do they claim they are charging only for the device drivers they wrote themselves? --------------------------------- Received: from acorn by kestrel.Ukc.AC.UK with UUCP id aa11238; 23 Mar 88 20:08 GMT Received: by acorn.UUCP (5.51/4.7) id AA27643; Wed, 23 Mar 88 18:08:47 GMT Message-Id: <8803231808.AA27643@acorn.UUCP> To: info-tex@uk.ac.aston Cc: gtoal@uucp.acorn Subject: Are we up to $10.24 yet?... Date: Wed,23 Mar 1988.18:40:37 From: GToal@uucp.acorn To TeX implementors: I have TeX 2.0 straight off the distribution tape of March 31 1986. A) What is the current version of TeX (Web/Pascal - not C I mean) B) Are there enough differences between version and 2.0 to make it worthwhile my bringing it up to date BEFORE I make the first Acorn release? C) If yes to (B), is there any way of getting the upgrades without either ordering a new tape from Maria Code or having the entire tex.web source mailed to me? Graham. --------------------------------- To: abbottp@uk.ac.aston.kirk Subject: SliTeX Date: 23 Mar 1988 17:40:33 GMT From: john@uk.ac.york.minster Message-ID: I have recently had need to build SliTeX for the first time; we are a troff house, really. I'm using the splain.tex which came with LaTeX 2.09 (Is that _very_ old?), and have had a little difficulty. Can you help? ------------------------------------------------------ This is Common TeX, Version 2.0 (INITEX) 23 MAR 1988 17:23 **splain \dump (./splain.tex Preloading the plain format: codes, registers, \maxdimen=\dimen10 \hideskip=\skip10 \@centering=\skip11 \p@=\dimen11 \z@=\dimen12 \z@skip=\skip12 \voidb@x=\box10 parameters, \smallskipamount=\skip13 \medskipamount=\skip14 \bigskipamount=\skip15 \normalbaselineskip=\skip16 \normallineskip=\skip17 \normallineskiplimit=\dimen13 \jot=\dimen14 \interdisplaylinepenalty=\count22 \interfootnotelinepenalty=\count23 macros, \strutbox=\box11 \mscount=\count24 math definitions, \rootbox=\box12 \p@renwd=\dimen15 \footins=\insert254 hyphenation (./hyphen.tex) (./sfonts.tex fonts, ! Font \fourteenrm=amsss8 scaled 1728 not loadable: Metric (TFM) file no t found. \relax l.14 ...msss8 scaled \magstep 3 % roman ? x No pages of output. ------------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------- Date: Thu, 24 Mar 88 14:07:29 GMT From: PMT6FRD @ UK.AC.LEEDS.UCS.CMS1 To: info-tex @ UK.AC.ASTON Subject: AMSFonts with DVILASER/HP We have been attempting to add the AMSFonts from the archive to our implementation of DVILASER/HP, so that we could use e.g. the Blackboard Bold characters from the font MSYM, on our HP Laserjet plus; so far without success. We seem to have transfered the files msym10.300pk through msym10.746pk alright to our Systyme (running VMS), and then via KERMIT transfered them to our PC Clone (an OPUS IV), then copied them into the respective directories dpi300 through dpi746 and renamed them all msym10.pk. (This to parallel the arrangement of all the other computer modern fonts.) We also transfered the TFM files and put those in the fonts directory. We then added the line to the dvihp.fnt file in the dvilaser directory which is supposed to tell dvihp what fonts are available; but we still get error messages telling us that font msym10 is not loaded, no .pk file can be opened. Can anyone tell us what we did wrong? The files came from the directory [public.tex.amsfonts.pxl300], which don't seem to be compressed; we had trouble earlier because we couldn't decompress the same fonts from the PAVEL section of the archive. The line we added to dvihp.fnt needed the font number; we took that from the ams list as 139. Is that the right number to use? The full line was: MSYM10 10 139 300 329 360 432 518 622 746; those last seven numbers being the various magnifications available. Any advice would be welcome! Frank Drake and John Derrick, Leeds University. --------------------------------- Date: 25-MAR-1988 09:49:14 GMT From: CENSWM@UK.AC.HW.VAXA To: abbott@UK.AC.ASTON Subject: More probs Peter I am having problems (again) in two areas! the first is trying to unpack the LN03 pixel files the problem is as follows: When I unpacked these pk files, they didnt work, I got all sorts of strange marks on the page. I have also been trying to create an new base file using inimf but I am getting problems here also. What I have done is this: I edited my WAITS.MF file with the new values of blackness. Ran INIMF loaded PLAIN and WAITS then dumped this out. However when I ran MF subsequently I got the error "I am stymied bad base file" I suppose the real solution is to buy the Metafont book! but have you any ideas as to where ive gone wrong. Any help would be appreciated Stuart. --------------------------------- Received: from acorn by kestrel.Ukc.AC.UK with UUCP id aa08152; 23 Mar 88 17:07 GMT Received: by acorn.UUCP (5.51/4.7) id AA26647; Wed, 23 Mar 88 17:03:43 GMT Message-Id: <8803231703.AA26647@acorn.UUCP> To: abbottp@uk.ac.aston Cc: gtoal@uucp.acorn Subject: Advance warning; files to follow... Date: Wed,23 Mar 1988.17:34:54 From: GToal@uucp.acorn Dear Peter, after a bit of poking around I have found the following: uuencode.c - portable, tested, public domain uudecode.c - portable, tested, public domain tar.c - not portable, not tested, minix shar.c - portable, not tested, minix compress.c - portable, tested, public domain I shall send each of these by mail immediately after posting this. I am not sure of the public domain status of code from the minix project: I believe it to be public domain but I have not seen this in writing anywhere yet. I have included shar.c in case it is of benefit to any unix sites who use your service, but shar is much less useful than the others as it needs the unix shell to decode it. Graham. +++Editor - I have the files but as yet am not sure how to make them available for use, I will investigate asap +++ --------------------------------- !! !! Replies/submissions to info-tex@uk.ac.aston please !! distribution changes to info-tex-request@uk.ac.aston please !! !! end of issue