[9fans] Porting XeTeX

[9fans] Porting XeTeX

[Joel C. Salomon]

A question for Jonathan et al.:  What is required of an operating
system to port XeTeX to it successfully?  A C compiler?  C++?
OS-level support for OpenType?  Is porting freetype sufficient?  A
different library?

I'm asking mainly because of Plan 9, a UNIX-like OS with a C compiler
(but no C++) to which the freetype library has been ported.  There's
an old port of TeX that doesn't work too well anymore, so there's been
some talk about porting a modern TeX.  (LuaTeX requires C++ for the
PDF library it uses, so that's out for now.)

--Joel

Re: [9fans] Porting XeTeX

[erik quanstrom]

> I'm asking mainly because of Plan 9, a UNIX-like OS with a C compiler
> (but no C++) to which the freetype library has been ported.  There's
> an old port of TeX that doesn't work too well anymore, so there's been
> some talk about porting a modern TeX.  (LuaTeX requires C++ for the
> PDF library it uses, so that's out for now.)

what do you mean "doesn't work too well anymore"?  i haven't noticed anything
going broken.

- erik

Re: [9fans] Porting XeTeX

[Joel C. Salomon]

On Fri, Mar 14, 2008 at 5:28 AM, erik quanstrom <quanstro@quanstro.net> wrote:
>  what do you mean "doesn't work too well anymore"?  i haven't noticed anything
>  going broken.

But lucio has had trouble.

I guess I overstated the case a bit.

--Joel

Re: [9fans] Porting XeTeX

[lucio]

> But lucio has had trouble.
>
That's because I am totally unfamiliar with TeX.

> I guess I overstated the case a bit.

Sorry to have put you in the firing line.

++L

Re: [9fans] Porting XeTeX

[Russ Cox]

> I'm asking mainly because of Plan 9, a UNIX-like OS with a C compiler
> (but no C++) to which the freetype library has been ported.  There's
> an old port of TeX that doesn't work too well anymore, so there's been
> some talk about porting a modern TeX.

don't waste your time unless there is something
about the current tex installation that doesn't

the only thing i can think of that current tex's can
do that the plan 9 tex can't is generate pdf with
hyperlinks.  unless you care a lot about this feature
(or some other), you're wasting your time.
the tex world doesn't exactly move quickly,
and the tex port (done in 1999, i think) incorporates
the last major revisions to latex.

next we're going to hear that since sam hasn't been
updated in about 10 years, it doesn't work too well
anymore, so it's time to port a "modern" editor like vim.

russ